The Trading Game
by hbrackett
Summary: Jackson discovers he has the ability to trade for anything he wants...even the power of an Alpha werewolf.  It's up to Stiles and a human  !  Derek Hale to try to get things back to normal...if Jackson is willing to deal.  Sterek AU Fic.  I 3 reviews!
1. Chapter 1

A/N – After writing "Jinx", I am somewhat hooked on the idea of random characters from Teen Wolf developing strange abilities. Might even make an interesting Challenge for all you other awesome writers out there! This one takes place immediately after the final episode. It will probably ship Stiles/Derek.

Derek leapt down the stairs, and the already terrified Jackson backed up against the door of the house which slammed shut behind him with a final-sounding click. Derek Hale, who was scary enough to begin with was now soul-freezing with menace. The look he gave Jackson with his bestial eyes (the crimson glow already lighting them up) told Jackson everything he needed to know. He was going to die, right this instant. He was a fool to come out here thinking otherwise. Derek smiled, knowing that Jackson recognized his fate. The killer teeth were out, Derek's head lunging forward to rip and tear. Jackson shrieked and tore off to the side, getting behind Derek, but now utterly trapped.

"Look at you. So eager to give away what I would_ kill_ for. Why so desperate to give up your humanity, Jackson? Because you know you can't cut it? Because you're no good at it? You are so goddamned pathetic it makes me sick. I could do it, you know. I could make you one us…but I already know what you would use your power for. The same thing you've been doing already; bullying everybody weaker than you and trying to convince the world that you're the best. In other words, overcompensating for the fact that deep down inside you're nothing but shit. How long do you think you'd be satisfied being a Beta in my Pack before deciding you had to be the Alpha? How long before you pulled together a Pack of Omegas that you could treat worse than slaves, starting with the ones you call your friends? How long before you began to _really_ hurt people to satisfy your ego, becoming a monster that my Uncle never dreamed of being? And you know what the sad thing is? _I_ am the one that envies you. _I_ am the one that looks at you and wishes I had your life. I'd have a family that is loving, attentive…and most importantly _alive._ I'd have a chance at a real life, maybe even find someone to love without worrying I'd tear their throat out. Have children without worrying some Hunter wasn't going to come along and kill them just for being what they were. I wouldn't have to be alone anymore. If you can't see that you're the lucky one, then you're even more broken and pathetic than I imagined possible. I am going to let you go…you have 30 seconds to get in your car and go tearing off in your shiny Porsche down that road and out of my life forever. Next time you come out here, you won't even see me coming…you will die, Jackson. No more threats."

Jackson stood there, head down as he took in Derek's words. When he looked up, his eyes shimmered with tears.

"Fuck you, and fuck your 30 seconds. I have something to say to you, and I don't care if you rip my throat out. You have _no idea_ what it's like to be me. You think you do, but you don't. You had a real family, even for a little while. I was _adopted._ My own parents didn't even love me enough to keep me. I will never know who they are or why they chose to give me away. Everything I've done was just to try and show them what a mistake they made. I wanted them to know what they gave up. And every time I fail…and I _do_ fail, Derek…it kills me inside. It makes me think they were right all along. And I will never be free of that feeling. I hoped that becoming one of you would…I don't know. Change the rules, get me to stop thinking about things the same old way…if I were like you, I wouldn't be connected to them anymore. I could be my own person. So, either I die or… I get to live in Hell. Some choice, Derek. Sometime soon, I don't know when…it's going to be too much for me, and I am going to check out. My parents reject me, you reject me…I'm not gonna wait around for it to happen again. Then you can spend the rest of _your_ life wondering if you made a mistake with me, too. What is it about me that makes people not want me, Derek? Am I really that bad?"

Derek said nothing, he just did not have the words that make the stupid kid understand. Jackson was in Hell all right, but it was a Hell of his own making. He locked himself in and had thrown away the key. He looked at everything in the worst possible way, and no magic werewolf bite could fix that for him. His anger at Jackson drained away, despite himself. It was hard to be angry with someone so screwed up. The crimson faded from his eyes.

Jackson walked up to Derek and looked him square in the eye, something he had never been able to do before.

"I would trade places with you in a heartbeat; you be the human, and let me be the Alpha. I'd show you how to get everything you ever wanted."

"I would take you up on that trade, Jackson. In a heartbeat. Now go home."

Jackson, bizarrely, put out his hand. A shake? Really?

Bemused, Derek took the hand and gave it a token shake. Then the two men collapsed backward onto the floor, feeling dizzy and nauseous. They recovered in a few seconds and stood up again.

"What the hell was that?" said Derek.

"No idea. Maybe it was us bonding."

"God forbid. I'd eat you for saying that if I didn't think I'd vomit. Out."

Jackson left. When his scent and the sound of the Porsche faded away, Derek pondered Jackson's words. Maybe Jackson would make a decent werewolf, but not until he got his head out of his ass. When would he realize that you can't live your life based on what other people's expectations were? There was no prize for it, except maybe a wasted life. A werewolf with Jackson's issues was the last thing the world needed.

Derek stretched, and decided to have another quick workout before retiring for the night. By his 50th chin-up, he knew something was wrong. His muscles were screaming, and he was nearly too exhausted to move. He must have worn himself out with all of the recent exertions; even the new Alpha strength was not infinite.

Sighing, he went up to his bedroom marveling that for once he could no longer smell the decay of the old house all around him. Maybe he was finally getting used to it.

Jackson arrived home, and sat in his car looking out of the windshield at the bright lights of his parent's house. Their house. The Whittemore estate, in the family for over a hundred years until Jackson came along. His father's sterility had insured that the old bloodline was ended…though the name at least would carry on. If they had been able to have their own children, they would never have taken in Jackson. They wouldn't have needed him. He was the consolation prize. He imagined the Whittemores on some corny game show.

_"I am so sorry, you didn't win the ten million and the trip to Aruba, but behind curtain number two lies the next best thing…a lifetime supply of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, and a baby no one else wanted!"_

Jackson masochistically enjoyed the feeling of self-pity that washed over him, even snickering at his own flight of fancy. It wasn't really as bad as all that…maybe Derek had a point. Maybe he was focusing too much on what he had lost instead of what he had. Maybe being a werewolf wouldn't have ended the feelings of abandonment and inferiority that plagued his thoughts. He was not going to ask Derek again, though not because of any of Derek's increasingly imaginative threats. In the morning, he would ask the Whittemores if he could see a counselor. It was time he got some help.

Stepping out of the car, he was suddenly overwhelmed by the smell of the wet grass, freshly watered by the underground sprinkler system. The odor enveloped him, he almost felt as if he were bathing in it. He even smelled the cold water in the pipes, and knew that if he tasted some, it would carry the metallic flavor of iron. A passing breeze brought to him the scents of the Mountain Ash trees that bordered the property, a cornucopia of animals living among the roots and branches; squirrels, groundhogs, rabbits…even a snake.

Jackson wondered at all of this before catching sight of the stars overhead, and the waning gibbous moon. It was like looking through a telescope. He laughed aloud, a clear carefree laugh that neither friends nor family had ever heard from him. Tearing his gaze from the night sky, he jogged to the front door and let himself in.

"Jackson?" called Martha Whittemore.

"Yeah, Mom?" he called back.

"Darling, you know I don't like you going out this late, and without letting us know. With everything that's been going on lately…"

"I'm fine, Mom. Don't worry about me."

"I will too worry, Jackson Whittemore."

Jackson entered the sitting room where his adopted mother sat drinking a cup of tea. A persistent sound began to imping on Jackson's hearing. A steady rhythmic pulsing. Almost like when he ran suicides for Coach Finstock, till his own pulse rang in his ears. But this seemed to be coming from her.

"If anything ever happened to you, Jackson, I don't know what I'd do. I love you more than my own life, you know.

The pulse was steady throughout this speech. He heard Scott and Derek talking about how you could hear it when someone lied by the change in heart rate. Obviously, his mother was telling the truth. But how could Jackson hear it? Was it hanging around them so much? No, that was stupid. A side effect from the claw marks on his neck? Unconsciously, Jackson rubbed at the spot…only to find that the scar was gone. Jackson's eyes widened.

"Um, I know Mom. I'm sorry, won't happen again." Jackson said quickly. He had to get to his room.

"Well, you look tired. Go on to bed, and I'll cook you a nice breakfast in the morning. It's Florence's day off, so I'm taking over the kitchen."

"Sounds good. Goodnight." He gave her a quick kiss (the scent of her soap, shampoo and perfume making his head spin) and fled up the stairs.

His room was a haven from the sensory input overload. So used to the sounds and smells within that he was able to ignore them and almost pretend that what happened in the sitting room and outside was his own imagination. He undressed and checked himself for bites and scratches, but found none. This was hardly surprising. If he had been infected, they would have healed. Using a hand mirror and the wall mirror together, he checked his neck. Clean unbroken skin. Derek must have infected him after all with that scratch, it had just taken longer. Could it be? Was he a werewolf? Wouldn't Derek have figured that out? Only one way to make sure…but now that the possibility existed, he found himself strangely reluctant to prove it one way or the other. It would be scary if it were true, and disappointing if it were not. He had had enough of emotional roller coasters for one night, so he got into bed and closed his eyes. He would try it in the morning…if there were indeed anything to try.

The next morning saw the beat up Jeep of Stiles Stilinski heading down the road towards the Hale house. Seeing Derek's Camaro there, Stiles pulled up all the way and was soon heading up the creaky steps to the front door. Pushing it open, he entered the silent foyer and called out Derek's name.

"Who's there?" came an oddly nasal voice from up the stairs.

"It's me, Sti-WHAT DO YOU MEAN 'WHO'S THERE'"

Stiles ran up the steps and found Derek sitting on his bed with his bare feet sitting in a porcelain bowl of steaming water, dressed in three layers of sweat suits and a bathrobe over it. He was shivering, and his teeth were chattering.

"Derek, what the hell…you have a cold?" asked Stiles.

"No, Stiles. It's Halloween, and this is my costume. Realistic, huh?"

"Sarcasm doesn't become you. I thought werewolves never got sick."

"That was your first mistake. You thought."

"Very funny. Seriously, what gives?"

"I don't know. I've never been sick before, aside from aconite poisoning."

"I'm almost tempted to take advantage of your weakened condition to pay you back for oh, about 600 bumps on my head. But I'll be nice and ask if I can get you anything."

"No, I'll be fine. Tell anyone about this and I'll let you pick which of your organs I eat first. I hear devouring annoying teenagers is very beneficial to werewolf immune systems. It's like Vitamin C."

"You must be sick, I've never seen you this cranky. Wait here, I'll see what I have in my Jeep. There was a food drive I helped out the local church with, and I still have a couple of boxes of non-perishable food."

"I remember that drive. It was 6 months ago."

"I know, I keep forgetting to hand it in. I'm easily distracted these days."

"Remind me never to put you in charge of any medical decisions if I'm in a coma."

"I SAID sarcasm doesn't become you. Be right back."

Stiles went out to the car and checked out the box. Plenty of cans of soup, some mac & cheese, Jello, and a box of teabags and a bear shaped bottle of honey. Perfect, except for the Jello.

Stiles carried the tray of food up to Derek once he had finished cooking, and Derek gratefully took the honey-laden tea and chicken soup while Stiles scarfed down a huge bowl of mac & cheese.

"It's amazing. I can't smell any of this, I can't smell you, I can't hear your heart, and I didn't even hear you pull up. I've never felt weaker in my entire life. It almost feels like…"

"Being human?" said Stiles through a mouthful of food.

"Please chew with your mouth closed."

"Remember that when you're eating my organs."

Derek laughed at that, and both he and Stiles started at the sound.

"My God, Derek. WHERE is Mr. Badass Werewolf? Of all the things I've seen here, this worries me the most. You NEVER laugh. And your threats, though eloquent, seem to have less force behind them than usual."

"I'm not sure. I feel like a weight has been lifted off me somehow."

"Try something for me. Make your eyes glow red, make your teeth grow, or your claws. Anything."

Derek shrugged, then glared at Stiles. He growled low in his throat, which soon led to a coughing fit. He recovered and tried again. He checked his teeth and nails. Nothing.

"My eyes?"

"Still the beautiful color of roadside slush."

Derek was tensing up now. This was impossible.

"Stiles, I need you to make me mad. Furious. Do something, hit me, anything."

Stiles paled. "Uh, no I don't think I really want to take that chance. You might make a quick recovery."

"Please Stiles!"

"All right. But I'm not going to hit you. I can think of something that will make you almost as mad though."

"Just do it."

Stiles got up and walked over to him. Derek closed his eyes, as if bracing for a blow. Stiles reached down, grabbed Derek's face with his hands, and kissed him full on the lips.

"Mmmmmmmmmmuuuuuahhhhh!" he said.

"STILES, WHAT THE HELL, ARE YOU CRAZY?" shouted Derek. He leapt up from the bed and lunged forward, forgetting that he was still standing in a bowl of water. He stumbled and fell right into Stiles arms. This move exhausted him instantly, and Stiles helped him back over to the bed. A quick check revealed no wolfish features.

"It's official. You are no longer a werewolf. Or Badass." Stiles quipped.

"I'll always be Badass."

"Strawberry Shortcake riding My Little Pony to a picnic at Barney's house is more Badass than you right now."

"Stiles, why did you kiss me?"

"Well, you asked me to make you mad and I figured that would work. Maybe not such a good idea, since you have a cold, but I didn't want to hit you."

"After all the times I hit you, you didn't want to take a one-shot freebie?"

"_I _don't get off on hitting people weaker than me." Said Stiles, pointedly.

Derek's mouth opened, then closed. He looked down at his (now cold) bare feet. Stiles went and refilled the bowl and brought it back, and Derek plunked his feet in gratefully.

"I suddenly feel ten thousand times worse than I did before. Thanks, Stiles."

"No problem. Remember this when you're Badass again."

"I'll never hurt you again. If I do, I will leave town and never come back. I'm…I'm sorry." Derek hunched down, looking absolutely miserable. "After everything I told Jackson about how he would bully other people if he were a werewolf, I realize I'm no better. I guess I owe him an apology too."

"When did you see Jackson?"

"He came here last night to try to get me to bite him again. I refused, and we had this weird conversation about how we were jealous of each other's lives. He even offered to trade, and I jokingly accepted…"

Stiles had a horrified look on his face.

"And you got sick right after? And no more ability to 'wolf-out'?"

Derek felt a sinking sensation in his chest.

"Stiles, that's crazy. How could something like that be possible?"

"Offer to trade me something. Um…let's switch eye color. You take my brown, and I'll take your…whatever color that is. Deal?"

"Okay, deal." They shook hands.

After ten minutes, they checked each other only to discover that nothing had changed.

"Okay, that didn't work." Said Stiles, red-faced.

"No, it was an interesting theory…unless it was actually _Jackson_ that powered the transfer." Derek pondered this incredible thought.

"Why should Jackson be able to do that? He's just an ordinary human."

"We don't know that, Stiles. There are many strange things in this world besides werewolves. From what you told me about Lydia, I'm beginning to wonder about her. Humans who get bitten either turn or die, and she is still lying there in a coma in the hospital. Also, in case you haven't noticed, Beacon Hills seems to be a magnet for strange things to happen."

"Oooh, like we're on a Hellmouth or something?"

"Oh, God please tell me you didn't just say that."

"I remember reading something about this though…when I was looking up all that werewolf stuff for Scott, my ADHD would kick in and I read about a lot of other creatures too. There was this one thing called a Cambion, and it is the offspring of a human and a demon. It's supposed to be really pretty…that's Jackson all right…and have some of the same deal-making abilities of the demonic parent."

"You think Jackson may be a Cambion? He was going on and on about being adopted."

"Right now, I think Jackson's an Alpha, and nothing could be worse than that."

"We've got to track him down. Lord knows what he might do. Let me grab a quick shower, and we'll go find him."

"Okay, I'll clean this mess up in the meantime."

"Thanks. Oh, and Stiles?"

"What?"

"You think Jackson is pretty?" Derek smirked.

"Oh, shut up." Grumbled Stiles.


	2. Chapter 2

Jackson headed out onto the practice field, flanked by Danny and Scott. Scott looked morose as usual, probably still mooning over that Allison chick. Finstock bellowed at them to get in line to take their practice runs at the goal.

"All right, boys, you know the drill. Move fast, pay attention to your opponents, plot out your course, adjust as needed and most of all "GET THE GODDAMN BALL IN THE NET!" Jackson called. The team shouted in unison.

Scott looked around, as if just realizing where he was.

"Um, yeah. Play hard, guys." He said lamely.

Jackson looked at his co-captain sourly. Part of being captain was energizing the team and making them feel like winners. Scott had all the enthusiasm of a spoiled child with a huge plate of spinach in front of him. It just wasn't fair that he used his werewolf abilities to scramble up next to Jackson who had worked his tail off to secure the top spot.

"You're a shitty captain, Scott. I don't like you, and I will never like you. But as one rival to another, I'm gonna tell you the truth like no friend will. Allison and her family are going to be the death of you. Know what? I'd give up being LaCrosse Captain and let you run the whole show if you would stop letting Allison and her stupid family screw your head up so much."

"I wish it were that simple, Jackson." Scott was so upset over the recent argument he had with Allison and her Hunter relatives that he didn't even rise to the bait like he usually did when someone cast aspersions on their perfect love.

"It _is_ that simple." Jackson hissed.

"If I could do it, I would."

Well, if Scott at least agreed that it was a good idea, then he couldn't be that far gone.

"Oh, for the love of Pete will you two stop bickering like an old married couple?" Danny demanded. "You are co-captains, and the team needs you to be a united front or we all suffer. Now, shake hands or both ends of this LaCrosse stick will find themselves in your asses."

Snickering at the image, Jackson and Scott shook hands. For the second time, Jackson felt nauseous and drained, but he recovered far more quickly than he had last night. Scott blinked and fell backward. Danny helped Scott up, looking concerned, unaware that deep inside Jackson and Scott's minds, a radical alteration in perspective was taking place. Jackson suddenly marched over to Finstock and said in a loud clear voice: "I quit. I don't want to be Captain anymore. Scott can have it. I'd like to stay on the team, but if you want me out altogether, I'm fine with that too."

Finstock's eyes were huge. Scott ran up to see what was going on, having picked up the conversation with his super-hearing.

"Quit? Quit! No one on my team quits! What the hell, Jackson! Can't take even a little competition? I need you to train Scott up so that he can take over when you graduate! He has potential, but you need to help him get there!"

"I don't need Jackson's help, Coach. I am 100% focused on the game. Just give me a chance to prove it!"

"The only thing you are 100% focused on is a brunette with a make-up addiction!"

"Yeah? Watch this!" Scott yanked the cell phone from a startled coach's pocket and dialed Allison's number from memory.

"Allison? It's Scott, on the coach's phone. I know this is sudden, but I think we should break up. Like you told me last night, we are who we are and nothing can change that. I don't even want to try anymore. If you want to talk later we can, but it won't change my mind. You hate what I am, your parents hate what I am, and since things…happened the way they happened, that is never going to change. So let's stop this while we are still friends. Goodbye." He clicked the phone off and handed it to a stunned coach.

Jackson was completely amazed. "You didn't even let her get a word in edgewise!"

"It was her voicemail. Let's go play. And Jackson, after practice…well, I need you to help me study. My grades are in the toilet, and my mother is looking into whether 67th trimester abortions are legal. Give me a hand?"

"Yeah, no problem. Good for you, man. I have some Soap on a Rope you can borrow if you ever need it."

They walked back onto the field, and Scott took complete charge of the team as if he had years of experience under his belt. He goaded the others to victory, gave constructive criticism peppered with praise when needed, and never for even a second took his eyes off the game. Jackson himself seemed to have no problem letting Scott take the lead, and you could almost feel the previous dissension between the two dissolve in the wind.

"Huh. Look at my boys maturing into men overnight. Sucks to be Allison though." Muttered Finstock to himself.

Stiles and Derek pulled up to the school in Derek's car and watched the boys playing on the field. The Saturday afternoon sun was warm without being oppressive, and Derek felt less likely to chatter his own teeth out of his head when he let it shine fully upon him.

"You still look pale, Derek. Maybe you should go home and let me Scooby around for you."

"Maybe I should chew into your stomach and enjoy half-digested mac & cheese."

"Ok, firstly that is completely gross. Secondly, you said you'd stop doing that."

"I _said_ I'd never hit you. Threats never entered the equation."

Stiles rolled his eyes. "They will become less scary if you never back them up."

"Unless I can make them more imaginative. Do you want to hear about what I'm imagining right now?"

"If I told you what _I'd_ imagined doing to _you_, believe me you'd be even more horrified."

"You're not that scary Stiles."

"Who said anything about being scary…" muttered Stiles under his breath. He still couldn't believe that after all Stiles had done for him, Derek hadn't figured it out. Did Derek just think he was that charming? Scott was Stiles' best friend, and Stiles had _never _made him chicken soup or tea with honey, washed his dishes, refilled a foot bath…or ever considered kissing him. But he had done all of that for Derek. Even to still want to hang out after all of the threats and head slams…Derek was like an abusive boyfriend without the boyfriend part. And still Stiles returned, sometimes hating himself and the hold that the older (ex) werewolf had on him. And as a human, he wasn't all that Badass attractive…but Stiles didn't care.

"What did you say?" Derek snapped. Stiles thanked the gods he had no more super-hearing.

"I said the only thing scary around here is that nasal voice of yours."

Derek laughed again, that free and clear laugh of one whose soul was bleached and white. That very un-Derek laugh that Stiles was becoming addicted to hearing. His blood quickened before heading south (leaving him light headed), but the accelerated heartbeat went unnoticed by the shivering man next to him.

They found a spot on the front row of the bleachers and watched the game. Derek only paid half-attention to the progress, instead focusing on Jackson and Scott. Stiles however noticed right away that Scott was calling all the shots, and even Jackson was following his barked out orders.

"There's something weird here, Derek. Scott is acting like he's the only Captain on the team."

Derek's eyes widened, and after a few minutes he realized Stiles was right.

"That's not like Scott to be focused on ANYTHING besides 'what's her name'."

When the game ended, Derek and Stiles caught up with the two players before they went into the locker room. Other than the four, the field was now empty.

"Hey Scott. Nice job out there, you make a great Captain! What do you think, Jackson?"

"He did a halfway decent job. I'm comfortable leaving it in his hands." Jackson shrugged.

Derek and Stiles glanced at each other.

"What do you think, Scott? Will Allison mind all the time and effort you're going to need to keep up the good work?"

"Why should I care? I broke up with her before the game."

Derek and Stiles were open-mouthed for almost 30 seconds. It _had_ to be Jackson's magic at work, or else Scott had been replaced by a lazy alien duplicate who hadn't done any research and was just winging it.

"So how did all of this happen, you guys…make a deal or something?" asked Stiles, trying to be nonchalant.

"Yeah, how did you know? Jackson said he's give up his Captain spot if I stopped obsessing over Allison, and we shook on it."

Derek rolled his eyes at how dense the two were.

"Doesn't it seem odd that both of you would spontaneously give up the ONE things you are both obsessed over?"

Jackson and Scott looked at each other, puzzled.

Stiles whispered to Derek "I think Jackson's power messed with their heads somehow."

"They can hear you, Stiles." Said Derek through clenched teeth.

Jackson looked at them, eyes wide.

"What power? What are you guys talking about? If you have something to say, cut the shit and say it!"

"Jackson has powers? Since freaking when?" asked Scott. "And why do you two know about it and we don't?"

"This is just one of Derek's bullshit games, Scott. Derek just can't believe after all of his lectures about what a selfish prick I am that I could step down as Captain to give you a chance. I guess it ruins his image of what a shitty werewolf I would make. I'm outta here."

Derek grabbed Jackson's arm.

"Hold on a minute-"

Jackson growled and grabbed the front of Derek's shirt, effortlessly lifting him off the ground. His eyes flashed crimson as he whipped his torso around and flung Derek towards the bleachers. Fortunately he landed just shy of them, preventing likely broken bones. Jackson's face began to stretch outward, his skin rapidly darkening as the scythe-like teeth and claws sprouted from their hiding spots. With a tremendous tearing sound, Jackson's clothes ripped off his body. Before Scott's and Stiles' terrified eyes, Jackson completed his change into the Alpha, and stalked towards Derek's prone body with massive jaws agape, claws twitching with the eagerness to rend and tear.

"HOLY MOTHER OF – STILES, WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?" Scott shrieked.

The Alpha looked back at Scott, and gave an enormous infuriated growl. Against his will, Scott shifted into the Beta state, and felt his mind consumed with the Alpha's mental commands to join him in destroying Derek Hale. Scott fought against it with all his will, especially as Stiles had run over to stand guard protectively over Derek's body. He had no weapon, but that didn't stop him. Jackson drew menacingly closer, the hot animal breath washing warmly over Stiles, who flinched in fear but held his ground. Scott, also in full attack mode came and stood beside the Alpha, growling menacingly.

The Alpha sent another thought echoing through Scott's mind: "Kill the puny one. The other is _mine!"_

Helpless, Scott moved to carry out the command. As the claws went whipping through the air towards his best friend, Stiles was suddenly yanked downward by a revived Derek who quickly pulled him under the bleachers. The Alpha lunged, too late to reach them and too large to follow. With maddened roars, the two werewolves began tearing at the metal framework, struggling to get to their trapped prey.

Derek looked bad, he had blood coming from his mouth and one hand wrapped protectively around his side.

"Th-that could ha-have gone…b-better." he gasped.

"Derek, what the hell do we do now?" whispered Stiles.

"We wait. I think that was his first change, and he won't be used to it. His body is burning enormous amounts of energy to maintain the shift. As long as he doesn't…feed…anytime soon, he will be forced to change back.

A metallic screeching sound told them that the Alpha had penetrated another level of the makeshift protective cage the bleachers formed. They scooted backward, only realizing just in time that Scott had gone around and started ripping through to them from the other side. The two humans stayed as close to the middle as they could, and helplessly prayed to whatever gods there were that the bleachers would hold out until Jackson was forced to shift back. One must have listened, because just as the two clawed hands were reaching for them from either side, they began to shift back towards human. Jackson passed out when his transformation was complete, while Scott just stood there shaking and looking at his now human hand which had been an inch from Stiles throat. His eyes were wide, and he was trembing with the realization of what he had almost done. He began to scramble backward, struggling to get away.

"Scott, it's not your fault!" screamed Stiles after him. It was too late. He was gone. Stiles and Derek stood up (Derek rather painfully) and together they managed to drag Jackson's body out from under the wreckage of the bleachers. Stiles ran to the locker room which was mostly empty by now and grabbed Jackson's regular clothes from his locker, along with one of his bottled waters. Returning, Stiles poured the water over Jackson's face, and he awoke, coughing and spluttering, looking around with wide scared eyes.

"What the hell happened?" he spluttered. He looked down and realized he was stark naked.

"Shit! Where's my uniform? What's going on?"

Stiles took a deep breath.

"Jackson, we want to tell you what's going on but you need to remain calm. If you doubt we are telling the truth, listen to our heartbeats. That's one of your new talents. Are you ready to listen?"

Jackson hesitated, then nodded.

"Jackson, you apparently have the ability to make magical deals that stick. You might be something called a Cambion, a demon/human hybrid. Last night, you made a deal with Derek and now you are not only a werewolf, but an Alpha…and Derek's human. You made a deal with Scott too. You've got to trade the wolf back to Derek."

Jackson was silent for almost a minute.

"No." he said.

"I don't want it back." said Derek.

Stiles looked between the two of them, amazed at what he just heard.

"What the hell do you mean 'No' and 'I don't want it back'! Jackson, you almost killed us just now! You want to take that chance again? Derek, what the hell! You have to take this off Jackson's hands! He can't handle it, and someone will get hurt! Are you two insane?"

"Jackson wanted this, and I was being perfectly honest when I said I'd trade. If he wants, I'll train him though I have barely more experience as an Alpha than he does. I never even went through the full shift yet. I can teach him what he needs to know though. Besides, Stiles, as you pointed out to me only this morning…I _also_ have a tendency to hurt people. If I can avoid having that on my conscience for the rest of my life, then I am very happy with the deal."

"You'd do that for me?" Jackson asked.

"Believe me, I think there will be a time when you'll beg me to take this back. And I won't."

"Not on your life."

"Oh, my God, the world has gone completely insane. Okay, forget this. Derek, let's get you to a hospital. No more werewolf healing for you." Stiles put Derek's arm around his shoulder. Derek sagged gratefully into him.

"No, Derek. Wait." Jackson said calmly.

"What?" Derek asked, sneezing and then crying out in pain.

"Derek, in return for your leather jacket, I will take on all of your injuries, plus that nasty cold. Deal?"

Derek and Stiles' mouths hung open at this suggestion.

Derek shrugged. "What the hell? I have seven more at home. Deal."

They shook on it, and once again felt brief weakness and nausea. Then Derek robotically handed over his prized jacket. As soon as Jackson wore it, he doubled over as a sharp cracking sound emanated from his rib cage, and he sneezed three times in quick succession. Derek himself felt a surge of energy rocket through his system, and when he checked himself he realized he was in a peak of health. After about a minute of Alpha werewolf healing, the injuries and cold (the puny virus was helpless against the werewolf T-cells) were gone from Jackson as well.

Stiles gave an excited laugh. "That was awesome! And I will be the first to admit; Jackson, you look totally Badass in that jacket."

"I NEVER agreed to trade my…Badass-ness…" said Derek defensively.

The three tracked down Scott (using Jackson's new abilities) all the way to his house. He sat on the front steps looking more depressed than Stiles had ever seen him.

He looked up at them (very warily at Jackson) and went to get up and retreat into his house.

"Scott, wait. You need to know what's been happening."

Scott stood still, his back to them, and listened to the story. When they finished, he turned around and gave them a piercing glare.

"Jackson, if you can do it, then take this away from me. I cannot be a werewolf anymore. It's just too much. If I had hurt you guys, I would be busy slitting my wrists right now."

Jackson looked uncomfortable.

"I don't think I can, Scott. I don't _have_ any humanity to trade you."

Stiles was doing some quick thinking.

"Can you…_broker_ a deal? I mean make it work between two people without you being directly involved?"

"We could always try. What do you have in mind?"

"Maybe Derek could go back to being a Beta if-" Derek cut Stiles off.

"I said no. I didn't give up just being an Alpha, I meant being a werewolf altogether."

"Fine. Then I'll trade. Scott, you can have my humanity and I'll be a Beta werewolf. Deal?"

Derek started to protest, shocked, but then kept quiet. Scott shook his head.

"You don't know what you're saying, Stiles. You don't know what it's like!"

"I think if there is any point at all to this, it's that we are all getting a chance to see things from another perspective. Let me _know_ what you've been going through. It will make me a better friend. If it…doesn't work, we can figure something else out."

"Stiles, if you are serious, you will be the best friend any guy has ever had. Please tell me you really want this and are not just doing this to be a…what's that self-sacrificing thing?"

"A lemming?" said Jackson.

"A martyr." gritted Derek.

"Yeah, that." Scott was looking intently at Stiles, not daring to hope.

"Just give it to me."

The two friends shook hands, and then Jackson took each of their free hands. The three felt the force whirl around them and through them, and pulled away, bent over and gagging.

"Did it work? Did it work?" asked Stiles, his eyes gleaming yellow.


	3. Chapter 3

Scott whooped aloud as he realized the wolf within him had gone. He leapt around the other boys, wild with joy. After a minute, Melissa McCall came outside to see what was going on. Scott rushed up the stairs and gave his mother the biggest hug. The tears of happiness running down his face and her startled attempts to comfort him gave the others the impression that the mother and son needed some family time. They began walking back towards the school, all three pondering their new states of being.

"Jackson. Don't shift anymore until tomorrow…be at my house at 10 am and I will begin teaching you how to control the change."

"Why can't we do it tonight?" complained Jackson.

"I have personal business to attend to tonight."

Jackson looked like he wanted to protest, but fell silent and went home.

Stiles got into the Camaro and they drove to Derek's house so he could pick up the Jeep. As Stiles made to get in his beat-up pride and joy, Derek touched him on the arm.

"I wanted to give you the opportunity to train with me first…if you feel you need it." Derek had a strange look in his eye, but Stiles (his new senses in overdrive) picked up that Derek was tense, almost nervous.

"Um, sure. I mean, I've been training Scott and I heard everything you have to say, but I guess experience is the best teacher."

The nervousness did not diminish, rather it seemed to increase.

"I didn't want this to happen to you. For more than the obvious reasons."

"I can handle this Derek. You saw Scott. He would have gone crazy if he had to be a werewolf one more second."

"I know. But now…certain things will have no choice but to come out. I won't be able to hide them anymore."

"What things?" Stiles asked, his own heartbeat racing alongside Derek's.

"Stiles, I was a goddamn werewolf. Did you never realize I _knew_ how you felt about me? Hell, I would have known even without that. That was some kiss this morning. Then there was how you took care of me when I was sick. Then there was how you stood guard over me, weaponless I might add, while Jackson was about to have your guts for garters. And all of that after how I've…treated you."

"Um…now that you mention it, I guess I thought you were just clueless…or not interested. Damn it, Derek, if you knew, couldn't you at least put me out of my misery?" Derek swam out of focus as Stiles' eyes filled up. He turned away, not wanting Derek to see.

Derek reached out to turn him back, then stopped remembering the last time he had grabbed a werewolf who didn't want to be grabbed.

"Stiles, what can I say. I was selfish. I loved the attention I got from you…I should have just stopped it…but it's not like I wasn't having similar feelings myself."

"Oh, you bastard. Why are you doing this to me? If you felt something all this time, then why the hell didn't you say something sooner? Why did you keep me cringing and hoping like a _pathetic school boy_ with a crush on his teacher?"

"If I allowed something to happen, you might have gotten hurt, especially once I was an Alpha. I couldn't bear it if I was responsible for…I can't even say the words. I eased my conscience with the um, rough treatment. I guess I kept hoping you would get so pissed off you would leave and not come back. But to _tell _you to get lost? I didn't have the strength. Now that I was human, I was going to…I mean before all of this other stuff got out of control…now _I'm_ worried about getting hurt. I wish you didn't take the wolf on, Stiles."

"Why the extreme reaction when I kissed you this morning?"

"What, and I should pass up an excuse to fall into your arms?"

Stiles was silent, and still facing away. Derek suddenly wondered which face he would be wearing if he turned around.

"I'm sorry. Everything I did was to protect you, Stiles."

The voice that answered Derek back was rough and barely human.

"I. Don't need. Protection!"

Stiles turned and leapt at Derek, knocking him to the ground easily. Derek's arms were pinned over his head, and the bestial yellow eyes bored into Derek's own. 'Here I am, about to be killed by a man I love, because I was a chicken shit coward.' He thought randomly. Derek closed his eyes and turned his head to the side, wondering whether it would be teeth or claws that ripped him open first. Bleakly, he hoped Stiles would be able to forgive himself for this in the future.

A savage ripping sound answered that question as the claws tore through Derek's shirt. The shreds that remained were yanked away. Stiles leaned down and smelled insistently at the naked torso beneath him. The Beta drank in the scent of the human, delirious with rampant desire. Derek struggled not at all, powerless to escape even if he wanted to. He did gasp aloud when he felt the wolf's tongue licking gently along the lines of his stomach muscles, lightly here, roughly there, sometimes nipping gently with the elongated teeth. Licking his way up to the exposed neck, Stiles couldn't help himself. He bit down gently, the teeth a hair from breaking the skin. Derek gave a shuddering gasp as the teeth released and the tongue lapped gently at the red spot before tracing its way upward and behind the ear. Derek opened his eyes and saw that Stiles had shifted back to human. Gods, the control that must have taken, not to rip the throat out in a shower of blood with all of Stiles' anger and desire at their peak. Derek himself could not be sure he would have been as strong. It was obvious that Stiles wanted Derek to take the lead, although he enjoyed his brief turn at being the aggressor.

Derek felt his old urge to always seize control return, and he grabbed Stiles roughly, not caring that the boy could kill him with ease. Derek yanked off the boy's shirt and slammed him into the ground and returned the favor that had recently been granted him, but with far less finesse and a great deal more force. He reveled in the fact that for all intents and purposes, Stiles was indestructible to Derek no matter how high his passion raged. He licked and bit Stiles, using much more pressure with his human teeth, and Stiles writhed and gasped under him, enjoying the attention. Derek grabbed him by the back of the neck and raped his mouth with the most forceful kiss the boy had ever imagined was possible. Derek was, in his own way, devouring Stiles. Able to abandon all pretense of fear for the younger man's safety, he aggressively took control, ripping off the rest of their clothes and attacking Stiles' body again. Stiles clawed at the earth with actual claws that pulled in and out as he lost control over his form. The boy alternately howled and screamed as Derek moved downward and engulfed him with his mouth and with savage frenzy brought Stiles to the most explosive orgasm of his life. And still, Derek wasn't done. Rolling Stiles onto his stomach, Derek positioned himself and brutally speared him, wrapping his arms in a death grip around Stiles' neck, and trapping the legs with his own. The small amount of leverage he had was enough to repeatedly slam himself into Stiles, with all the ferocity of a wild beast himself. Derek screamed into the night as the tidal wave claimed both of them this time, then he collapsed down and the two lay quietly in the grass, staring up at the moon and stars and the endless expanses of space that lay between them. It was almost five full minutes before Stiles spoke.

"That…that was…"

"Shhh."

And they slept that way, curled into each other and unmindful of anything else but the sensation of having finally reclaimed the other halves of their souls.

The next morning, Derek woke up alone and knew an instant of panic before he saw the bare footprints leading towards the house.

Heading in, he heard the shower running in the one working bathroom and found his mate busily scrubbing himself clean.

"Hey there." Stiles said, without facing him. Derek had been as quiet as death, but of course the boy sensed him. Derek got in the shower with him and together they scrubbed the dirt away from each other, an earnest attempt to clean becoming an excuse to run their hands over each other's bodies, and soon they were at it again, unable to get enough of each other, not stopping until the water ran cold. Then they continued their game in the bedroom, and were just basking in warm afterglow when Stiles suddenly sat straight up, sniffing the air and cocking his ear.

"Jackson." Was all he said.

Derek groaned. He looked at his watch. "A half hour early, the bastard."

"He can hear us. I think the cat's out of the bag."

The two dressed quickly before heading downstairs. Jackson was looking at them, wide-eyed.

"Oh, what?" said Stiles peevishly.

"Nothing. Guys, you know Danny is my best friend. Just a little surprised, that's all. Should I leave? I can come back."

"And put more lives at risk just so I could get laid for the third time in my life? I wouldn't hear of it." Stiles went out to his car after giving Derek a hug and a peck on the cheek.

"Call you later!" he shouted as he drove off.

Derek sighed, looking after him. Then he looked back at Jackson, who was bitterly wishing he had stayed away for another hour or two.

"Let's go out back. I don't want you to break anything in here." Derek said, sarcastically.

{}{}{}{}

Derek called Stiles cell phone at around 8pm that evening after Jackson had gone home, and said wearily "I need to get out of this house. I know a great little place up north. Want to join me?"

"Sure thing. I'm right outside."

Derek chuckled and saw the Jeep just pulling up to the front door. Derek grabbed another leather jacket, and the two took off in the Camaro.

"What the hell are you wearing?" asked Derek.

"It's my Catholic School Boy outfit. I thought it might be fun later."

Derek chuckled. "You're insane. I like it."

They went to a restaurant/bar in Red Falls called 'Thatcher's Folly" which had, according to Derek, the tastiest hot wings in the entire world. A football game played on the television, and some local hicks were watching it with the rapt attention of the damned. After they had shared an enormous bowl of wings (which were fantastic), Stiles noticed a Ms. Pac-Man video game in the corner, and immediately dug out some quarters to go play. Derek watched him maneuver the ravenous yellow female monster through maze after maze, alternately avoiding and devouring the four ghosts without ever losing a life. Suddenly, Stiles shouted "Take over for me!" and ran to the men's room. Derek had a second to grab the stick and flee for his digital life as the ghosts repeatedly tried to snare him in a series of ingenious pincer moves. Then, the joystick refused to respond for a second, long enough for Mr. Pac-Man to become a widow as his wife slid smoothly into the ravenous maw of orange Sue and quietly spun around in her death throes.

"Aw, come on." Said Derek, slapping the machine on the side.

The television suddenly flashed and went dark. Three of the men at the bar turned and gave him an evil look.

Stiles was covering his ears at the overly loud Muzak that played in the tiny bathroom while he tried to wash his hands at the same time. Did it really need to be this loud? At first, he did not hear Derek's screams. When the odor of blood and adrenaline crept in, he slammed open the door and rushed out to see three of the bruisers at the bar busy delivering simultaneous kicks and punches to an unconscious Derek. The waitress/cook/cashier was frantically dialing the police on the phone in the kitchen.

"_LEAVE HIM ALONE!"_ Stiles shouted, his voice far deeper than his stature (and outfit) would seem to allow.

The three turned towards him, smiling at first until they noticed that the little Catholic School Boy had eyes that glowed an unholy yellow.

Stiles growled, his fangs beginning to jut over his lips as the men backed away. As his claws emerged and his face slid towards the bestial, Stiles reached over and picked up the Ms. Pac-Man machine as if it were a paper weight, and hurled it at the three attackers. The three were crushed with the force of the blow against the wall, and they fell screaming to the floor. Groans told the boy that they were not dead, and he longed to go over and finish the job _ever-so-goddamned-slowly_ when a small moan from Derek realigned his priorities. He gently picked up the dazed man and brought him outside to the Camaro, pulling the keys from Derek's pocket and driving away until they were back at Beacon Hills. A brief stop at Jackson's house led to another 'brokered' injury transfer, this time to Stiles. He recovered more slowly than Jackson (who had offered to be the recipient) but he wanted to feel what his mate had felt so he could justify his actions that night. As the sharp pain ripped through him, he wished he would have stayed long enough to throw the pool table at them next. Derek took Stiles back to the boy's house (his father was gone for the entire weekend) and made as if to drop him off, but Stiles begged him to stay the night.

As they spooned into each other in the teenagers' bed, Derek stroked Stiles' hair gently.

"You shouldn't have done that on my account you know." He whispered.

"I believe the proper response is 'Thank You'." muttered Stiles. "They'll live, unfortunately."

"And what happens when the story of the vicious Catholic School Boy Werewolf breaks over the news?"

"By the time they retell it, I'll be seven feet tall and breathing fire."

"I have to say that my manhood has taken quite a beating."

"Considering the beating your manhood gave _me_ last night, I don't feel at all sorry for it."

Derek chuckled at that and was ready to let the matter drop when Stiles spoke again.

"Derek, I could have killed them."

"But you didn't. You held back. Somewhat."

"No, that's not what I mean. I mean I _could_ have. I wanted to, and it would have meant nothing to me. Where you're concerned, I have hardly any restraint. When I saw what they had done…they became prey."

"And at last you know how it feels…felt… to be me. Imagine looking at the world that way, at the people you love as well as the people you hate. There is a fine line between the powerful emotions…and the wolf _cannot_ see it."

"I'm afraid my wolf does see it, but doesn't care."

"Stiles, I think you have better control over it than I did, and you'll only get better at it with experience. Don't worry about it. And thank you."

Stiles rolled over to face him.

"I waited so long to be here with you. Now that you're here, I feel terror at the thought of losing you. Is that what love is?"

"That's it exactly."

"What a _bitch_."

"Mm-hm."

"I suddenly feel for Scott and Allison…not that they're an item anymore."

"We should get Jackson to get those two back together."

"Nah."

Derek burst into laughter at that, and Stiles joined him. It was pure evil mirth brought about by the huge inconvenience that particular relationship had caused everyone around it.

"Let's do it after High School is over. This way at least Scott can get a good job so he can pay his alimony in a few years." Stiles quipped.

Derek looked suddenly serious.

"Stiles, I have to say this. I think that I-"

"Me too."

And because they knew that their time was short (even forever would be too short), they spent the night making sure not a single second of it was wasted.

{}{}{}{}

Jackson took a long time to get to sleep that night, thinking over the day's training with Derek. It was a good thing Stiles didn't know how many times he had injured Derek, only to take back those injuries in return for pebbles, dry leaves, whatever lay at hand. The trade didn't have to benefit both sides in any way, it just had to be agreed upon voluntarily following up with some kind of physical contact after the verbal contract was spoken aloud. He pondered the uses that this ability could have, and wondered again at the bizarre chance that even allowed him to discover it.

He remembered a time when he was about twelve, and Martha Whittemore had forbidden him to go outside and play with Danny until his room was clean.

"Mom, let me go out now, and I promise my room will be clean when you get back from the store."

"Very well, Jackson, it's a deal. But I will only be gone an hour." She gave him a hug, stumbling after a sudden wave of nausea. Jackson had gone out to play, and of course had forgotten the time. He guiltily went to his room only to find Martha exclaiming that it had never before looked so spotless. The floor was vacuumed and the windows were even washed! Up until today, Jackson had assumed his mother had done it for him as some kind of object lesson, but he never pushed matters to find out for sure. What had happened in this room? Had some demonic cleaning service from Hell appeared because of his deal? He would never know, and looking around the room now made him nervous. What if some of them remained? He had never allowed the room to fall into such disarray again, and now vowed he never would.

_Cambion_. Jackson muttered the word aloud, perturbed by its strangeness. All his life he wondered about his parents…and now this. According to Jackson's own research, one of his parents was human, the other a demon…incubus or succubus. The human mothers in these pairings always died during childbirth. The human fathers _sometimes_ met their ends at the hands of the female demon right after the act was over, but others lived to tell the tale. Was his human father alive? Could Jackson pass the trait onto a child…if a woman could even have one by him and live? The only thing he did not have the power to trade was the trading ability itself. Three separate website corroborated this fact although Jackson had no desire to try.

It felt strange to think that he had always been special without knowing it, and stranger still that chance had led him to acquire his current status…the most powerful breed of werewolf in the world.

A new thought occurred to him. Between the two sets of powers he had now, he might be in a unique position to discover if he had a human father, and if that father were alive. If he were, than it was likely he lived or had lived here in Beacon Hills. The thought made his pulse race, and he fought to calm himself down. He began imagining what it would be like to talk to the man who had given him away, to finally get those answers he had waited his whole life to hear. Jackson would finally know if it was some flaw in him that caused the abandonment…though the aspect of his demon heritage lent serious weight to his adoption being a matter of necessity. A dead human mother or a father too horrified to confront the results of his unholy coupling with a succubus took the focus completely off Jackson…or at least off him personally. He could have been any baby, and his father might have wanted to give him up. That thought was comforting. Then he thought of his demon parent…would he ever see him/her/it? Was it back in Hell? Roaming the earth and seeding it with Jackson's half brothers and sisters? Was it summoned? And by who? And most importantly…what happened to Cambions when they died? Jackson pictured an unholy and fiery family reunion in a sulfur-smelling banquet hall in the exclusive section of Hell…the Employee section.

Jackson shook his head. If anyone could tell him, it would be his human father…if he had one. Tomorrow would see the beginning of the most important quest of his life.


	4. Chapter 4

A/N I just want to say that I love all my loyal fans who keep reviewing my work, I live for you guys. This chapter is a bit Jackson centric, but Sterek will be showing up again soon. Hope you enjoy!

Jackson sat in chemistry class later that week with an amazingly focused Scott and an amazingly unfocused (even for him) Stiles. While Scott was studiously copying the complicated formulas Mr. Harris had written on the blackboard, Stiles was covering the page with his own equations.

'Stiles + Derek = Sterek. Stilinski + Hale = Stale? (This was crossed out) Halinski?'

Jackson rolled his eyes. Stiles had gone around the bend and back again over Derek. It made him smile, and he wondered how their relationship would affect their personalities. He pictured Derek at home goofing around on his computer and Stiles prowling the dark forest menacingly in search of prey…almost like a trade.

That thought swung him back around to his plans for after school. After trying all the leads he could think of and coming up with nothing, he reconsidered some earlier options he had discarded. He was born in the Beacon Hills Hospital, but he doubted any records of an adoption would be retained there. Birth certificates would be altered to include the names of the adoptive parents. No orphanages existed in the town, so that left Social Services. If he were removed for abuse or neglect and adopted, they would have those files. Danny was the computer whiz, and he knew the boy could do it (he had certainly done worse things years ago, and had never gotten caught). Danny was at home today with a serious knee injury received on the LaCrosse field yesterday. Now that Jackson thought about it, this would be the perfect time to go see him and get him to help.

Jackson raised his hand. Mr. Harris immediately stopped his lecture and said in his usual concerned way (with Jackson, and no other student) "Yes, Jackson? Is there something you need?"

"I'm not feeling well. I'd like to leave early if I can." The class held their breath.

"Certainly. I'll sign a slip for you, you can go on home if you like, this is the last period anyway."

Jackson smelled the confused antagonism from the class as they wondered again at the special treatment he always received. If Scott had asked to leave early, Harris would have poured sulfuric acid on his head.

Jackson's now excellent hearing picked up Teddy Danforth whispering in the back row 'Lucky bastard. Bet Harris has a crush on him.' Jackson made a mental note to beat the crap out of Danforth tomorrow and left the class.

Jackson texted Danny and told him he was on his way over. When he arrived, the front door was unlocked and Jackson let himself in. Danny was in the living room watching Brokeback Mountain (it was near the end) and sniffling into a tissue.

"Oh my god, Danny. Really? You're like Lydia and the goddamned Notebook."

"Screw you. Shut up or I'll rewind it to the sex scene."

Jackson sighed and sat down beside his best friend and watched until the climactic scene showing the nested cowboy shirts and pinned up postcard made Danny groan in sympathy, before the end credits finally started to roll.

"Jackson, are you tearing up too?" said Danny suspiciously.

"NO! Shut up." Jackson blinked several times. "Listen, I need your help with something important. You know how I was adopted? Well, I need your computer skills to find out who my real parents were."

Danny looked uncomfortable. "That's seriously illegal stuff, Jackson. There's agencies you can go to that will do it for you, legally. Why the sudden rush?"

"I've discovered things about myself that make it vital I find out, as soon as freaking possible. Yesterday, if you can manage it."

"I can try. Is it like some genetic condition? Are you sick?" Danny asked worriedly.

Jackson took a deep breath.

"It's a genetic condition all right. Humor me for a second. Danny, I agree to take on your sprained knee if you can help me find my biological parents using all of your computer hacking talents. Deal?"

Danny laughed. "I wish. The sucker hurts like a bitch and I may never be able to play LaCrosse again. Finstock broke down in tears when he found out. But sure, okay. Deal."

Danny shook Jackson's outstretched hand and was overcome with the nausea that Jackson barely even noticed anymore. Jackson braced himself for the pain, but it still caught him off guard…poor Danny must have really jacked his knee up. He gave a short shriek of pain, but then sighed as it slowly faded away. Maybe he should become a faith healer if his other life plans crapped out.

Danny gave a scream himself as his knee furiously knit itself back to perfection. Then he tore off the supportive brace and bandages and marched like a robot under the compulsion of the deal over to his computer. Jackson followed him as Danny's lightning swift fingers flew over the keys and he began hacking into the state government's Social Services database. Firewall after firewall was obliterated as Danny moved through the Internet like a Ninja Assassin, covering up his tracks every step of the way, using a chain of proxy servers that would be impossible to trace. Social Services had no records, neither did Beacon Hills General Hospital. Danny checked the Office of Vital Statistics next, and cross-checked any records of children born on Jackson's birthday.

"Baby John Doe, born June 13, 1995. Yours was a private adoption. You were given up under the Safe Haven Act which lets a mother give up rights to a child with no penalty as long as the infant is under 30 days old. No records of the mother were retained…she literally does not exist in the records. Hmmm, this is odd. This scan of the receiving document from the hospital has an optional place where the parent can sign over the child if they wish to be found by them later on. I bet people either leave it blank or use aliases or just put an 'X'…but here are some initials. A.H. That is all there is, Jackson, all you have to go on."

Danny sagged as the compulsion left him. He turned to Jackson, a half-confused and half-angry look on his face.

"Now, will you tell me how the _hell_ you fixed my knee, and how you got me to hack almost the whole goddamn Internet? I'm good, but I've never been better than just now…like I was forced to do the very best I could. Don't bullshit me Jackson, I'm not in the mood."

Jackson tried to tell only that part of the story that pertained to his Cambion abilities, but slipped too many times for Danny's suspicious ears and wound up having to relate the whole werewolf saga from the beginning.

Danny took it all in, having no choice but to believe considering his healed knee. He requested a demonstration of the werewolf powers, but Jackson refused saying it was too dangerous.

"Derek is training me to control it. Until that happens, that wolf is staying in the box…at least until the next full moon."

"And both Stiles _and_ Derek play on my team? Damn it, I knew I should have told the little bastard he was attractive."

"Dude, be cool about that stuff. I don't think he's told anyone yet, you remember what that's like."

"Just a little jealous, that's all. That Derek is centerfold material."

"Whatever. Thanks for your help." Jackson decided to ask Derek how to proceed, and drove his Porsche to the burned out house. Derek was working under the hood of his Camaro, shirtless and covered in grease. 'Too bad Stiles was missing this.' smirked Jackson to himself.

Derek was listening to 'Howl' by Florence and the Machine. Jackson rolled his eyes. Typical werewolf music.

_'If you could only see, the beast you made of me…_

_ I've held it in but now it seems you've set it running free._

_ The Saints can't help me now, the ropes have been unbound…_

_ I hunt for you with bloody feet across the hallowed ground.'_

Jackson found himself liking the beat and the song. Usually his tastes ran more to Adele…'Someone Like You' always made him tear up…but he thought he might have to download this from iTunes.

"DEREK!" he called.

Derek's head smacked up into the hood in surprise. Jackson chuckled, pitying the ex-werewolf not at all after his sneak attacks over the past few months.

Rubbing his head, he saw Jackson and growled, stomping over to him. "Jackson, the next time you startle me like that, I swear I'm going to rip your throat out…with my…teeth." He trailed off, flushing red. Derek shook his head ruefully. "I have got to remember to come up with more human threats…Jackson, the next time you trespass, I'm going to fill you so full of lead, I could sharpen your head and use it as a pencil. Was that scary at all?" Derek looked hopeful.

"Terrifying." said Jackson in a bored voice. Derek cursed under his breath.

"Stiles was right. My Badass-ness is gone." Derek went and slumped down onto the front steps of the house.

"Yeah, sorry, but now onto problems that someone actually cares about…" began Jackson. He related his progress on the search for his parents.

"Jackson, why DO YOU CARE? Either they gave you up because they had to, or they gave you up because they didn't give a shit. They couldn't have known…who you were or what qualities you had, they couldn't _judge_ you. Your adoptive parents have shown you for years that they loved you more than anything. Can't you return that love to the people who earned it? Besides, if one of your parents was a demon, they certainly aren't inhabiting the human host anymore."

"What? What do you mean 'human host'?"

"Jackson, demons _possess_ people. They aren't corporeal…er, solid beings. They possess somebody, mate, produce the child, and leave. If it was your father who was possessed, he won't have any memory of conceiving you. If it was your mother, she's…gone now."

"If my mother was the demon, then my father can at least tell me what I want to know, and maybe something about her. A.H. is all I have to go on. Derek…were any members of your family named with an "A"?"

Derek looked sharply at him. "That's all I need, to be related to you. Hmmm, no I'm afraid not."

Jackson deflated.

"Jackson, This is a little off-topic, but I've been wondering if there is anything you can do for Lydia. She's still in that coma, and you might be the only way she gets out of it."

"I've already thought about that. How can she agree to anything if she's unconscious? Both parties have to verbally agree before the deal works. Even when I'm 'brokering', the agreement is necessary."

"How old is Lydia?" asked Derek.

"Um…she'll be 18 in three days, now that I think of it. We both will." mused Jackson.

"You both have the same birthday? That's odd. You think that maybe since she's still a child under her parent's guardianship, they can agree on her behalf?"

Jackson suddenly sprang to full alert awareness. "Jeez, it's worth a shot. I'll head over there now."

Jackson dove into his Porsche and drove to the hospital.

"That killed two birds with one stone." muttered Derek as he watched Jackson race away.

Lydia's parents happened to be visiting, for which he was grateful. They were not surprised to see him, and waved him to sit down in a chair. The Martins looked devastated. Jackson hated to rush them into an explanation of things, but time was of the essence.

"Listen…this may sound strange, but I may be able to help Lydia. It's sort of a medical procedure that I've been learning a lot about. It requires the permission of a parent. Would one of you be willing to let me try it?"

The two looked at him.

"What kind of procedure? The doctors all told us there was no hope." Said Catherine Martin, wiping her eyes.

"There is literally no time to explain. I need one of you to give me permission to help Lydia, and I need it now!" Jackson was getting desperate.

"Go ahead, Catherine. You know I can't." said Thomas Martin. He got up and left the room.

"What was that all about?" asked Jackson, looking after him.

"Jackson, it's really not any of your business. It's a very old story and I just don't want to tell it. I would have had to tell Lydia someday, but now there is no need to bring it up ever again. Please just let it go. If you can help her, then go ahead." said Catherine.

Jackson thought fast. "If taking Lydia's injuries away had a price…to be named later…would you pay it?"

"Yes, of course Jackson! I would pay anything at all!" she started getting tense, seeing that Jackson was absolutely confident in his belief Lydia could be helped.

"Get up, and take Lydia's hand." Jackson told her. Bewildered, she did as he asked. Jackson took Lydia's other hand…and then grabbed Catherine's. All three rocked with the force that surged through them. Jackson shouted aloud as his stomach and arm were sliced open. He fell on the floor, waiting for the injuries to knit. When they faded, Jackson stood up, his shirt bloody. Lydia's injuries were fading, until at last she opened her eyes.

"Lydia, darling!" screamed her mother. Thomas rushed back in, his face frozen in unbelieving shock.

"Ugh, what did that creep do to me? Don't tell me I missed the rest of my Formal." complained Lydia.

Some doctors came in and gave Lydia a thorough examination, exclaiming over her miraculous recovery. Lydia put up with it for about ten minutes before dismissing them imperiously from the room.

"Mom and Dad. Thanks for taking some time away from your lawyers to come visit me."

The Martins looked uncomfortable. "Oh, don't worry about that, dear. We will always be here when you need us." Catherine was tearing up as she said this.

"Good, while I have you two in a receptive mood, there are some things I need to talk to you about. Things need to change around here. Sit!" she commanded. The Martins sat down, open mouthed. "Jacks, give us a few, would you? The gift shop is just downstairs if you're thinking of getting me anything."

Jackson chuckled to himself. Same old Lydia. He went to the gift shop and had about three dozen roses sent up to her room, then to be on the safe side, he called up Tiffany's after perusing their online catalog and purchased a necklace that would have made two mortgage payments at the Stilinski household to be delivered tomorrow. Jackson went back to wait outside the room.

Later, the Martins came out to thank Jackson looking a little shell-shocked from the royal reaming they had no doubt gotten from Lydia, but still obviously happy that she was well.

"I don't know what you did in there, but we will never be able to repay you!" said Catherine joyfully.

"You know, we were thinking about getting a divorce, and I am ashamed to say we were using Lydia as a pawn in our stupid arguments. All of this has made us see how foolish we were. Well, that and Lydia paying us back for years of being caught in the middle of us. Thank you, Jackson. Catherine, I'm going to call the rest of the family." He went down to the lobby to use his cell phone and spread the joyful news.

Jackson looked at Catherine. "And now for my price. Tell me what you were keeping from me in there about Lydia, and your husband saying he couldn't give parental permission…and after you tell me I want you to forget that you did."

Catherine looked shocked and angry, and she began to shake her head no when the compulsion fell on her. She began to speak in a lifeless voice.

"Thomas is not Lydia's father. I was having an affair. Things were really bad in the marriage, and I…made a mistake. I broke off the affair…but something happened to me, I had some kind of attack that knocked me unconscious. I woke up in the hospital…I still have no idea what happened. Later, I learned I was pregnant. Thomas had been away for months, and he knew he couldn't be the father. That's why we have been having so many problems. On top of that, I had twins…but one of the babies died. We were never the same after that."

"Who was the father?" asked Jackson, morbidly curious.

"Adrian Harris…your chemistry teacher." A confused look passed across Catherine's face. "What were we talking about?"

"Nevermind. I'll come see Lydia soon." Jackson fled the hospital, a sick feeling in his chest. A.H. Adrian Harris? How did these puzzle pieces fit together?

Jackson drove to the chemistry teacher's apartment on the outskirts of town. He was buzzed in, and was soon being let into the dark residence of a man he had never before taken more than a passing glance at.

"Three guesses why I'm here. I think it's time for you to spill your guts. Or I can spill them for you. Do not lie to me." Jackson stated.

"So, you know. I would be very interested to find out how."

"Nevermind that! Are you mine and Lydia's father!" Jackson shouted, his eyes aflame.

Harris shrugged.

"I've never been lucky with women, Jackson. The last woman I dated used me for information on how to burn down the Hale house. The one before that was a spoiled trophy wife looking to get even with her negligent husband. When she attempted to break it off, I was pretty angry and did something I regretted."

"What was that?" Jackson had a feeling he knew.

"You know me as a chemistry teacher, Jackson. What if I told you that there was little more than a difference in perspective between that science…and magic? What if I told you that what scientists perceive as mindless forces are in fact gods or demons that can be begged or even bribed to change the way they function? I was in love with Catherine…the right cologne, mixed in my lab under the right phase of the moon…and she was in love with me. At least temporarily. My hope was that I could kindle a genuine spark in her that would last beyond the effect of the spell. I was wrong. She broke off the affair the second the duration was over. So, I…performed a major evocation. I conjured up a succubus from the Underworld and sent it into dear Catherine. The night of passion we shared would make Don Juan himself weep with jealousy."

Harris smiled lasciviously at the memory, and Jackson was sickened.

"But if she was my birth mother and she was possessed…how could she be alive? And what about me, aren't I supposed to be dead?"

"Jackson, you were the whole point of the process. I could have a son, and one who would have the power to avoid the traps and pitfalls that destroyed my own path. I knew the risk, but I couldn't bear to have Catherine die despite my anger with her. Also, her death might have caused a scandal. So, in the post-coital bliss of my union with the succubus, I…made a few deals. The first was that Catherine would survive the birth. The life of another woman in town would be randomly selected, but not for a period of years. The second condition was that two children be produced, so that I could have one of my own and the succubus claim the other in the usual way."

"Wha-wait, what do you mean 'claim'?" asked Jackson.

"Cambion children are claimed by their demon parents when they turn 18…but they can only claim one. By having twins, I was assured of your safety. Lydia will be claimed by the succubus and you will be safe. I had planned to reveal everything to you once that happened. Due to my…financial difficulties, I could not raise you myself, and I doubt I would have made a good father anyway. Some minor magic made the Whittemores sterile, and sent them looking to adopt…just as you came along. The succubus left after the birth, but Catherine was unconscious for a few days…long enough to fake your death and turn you over to the Whittemores, whose fortune you will someday inherit. Sooner, rather than later if I have anything to say about it."

"So you're saying Lydia…is my sister?" Jackson was stunned. A red fury was building up in him with all of these revelations. Harris seemed to have no conscience at all, he just recited these atrocities as if telling about his summer vacation.

"Oh, come on, you've seen how beautiful she is, plus her natural intelligence and her commanding manner. She is her mother's daughter…her real mother. She will make an excellent succubus."

"She never had any deal making powers!" Jackson exclaimed.

"Really? How many times has she gotten you to do things you never wanted to do? I don't think she realizes yet, she just assumes it's the force of her personality that gets others to obey. In a way, she is more right than she imagines."

Jackson thought about all of the times he watched the 'Notebook' against his will. All the bitchy crap that he put up with just to keep her as a girlfriend, for the elusive promise…never attained (thank goodness, in retrospect) that their relationship would go to the next level.

"Two more questions. Who died in place of Catherine Martin?"

"I don't know. I have my suspicions…but I don't know. It was to be a random selection."

"_Who?_" growled Jackson. The Alpha shook itself fully awake in the cage of Jackson's subconscious, growling and pawing at the door.

"Why, the late Mrs. Stilinski of course."

Jackson stared, horrified. _SLAM!_ The cage door shuddered as the Alpha hurled itself against it, hate and rage pouring from it and mixing with Jackson's own.

"How can I prevent her from being claimed?" said Jackson.

"You can't. Cambions simply do not have the power to fight a full-fledged demon."

**SLAM! **He could almost hear the growling from the thing in the cage, then realized it was coming from his own throat.

"I'm more than just a Cambion, 'Dad'." Jackson looked at his father, his eyes flashing red. "I would kill you now, but I think there is someone else who would rather have the pleasure."

And Jackson howled, the Alpha wolf fully taking over his being as Jackson let the cage door swing wide. The howl reverberated through the town until it reached the Hale property. Stiles Stilinski jerked his head up from where it had been resting against the neck of Derek Hale, and shifted into the full Beta state as he took off through the woods in search of his pack leader.

"Stiles!" shouted Derek, frozen with shock. Derek heard the howl, and knew what it meant. The Alpha was calling out for Stiles to join him in a kill.


	5. Chapter 5

Derek scrambled into the Camaro, frantically yanking the ignition key and causing the motor to roar into life. The CD player came on, and the next song in his mix blared out (Fade Away by the Black Heart Procession). Derek made to turn it off, then left it on hoping it would distract him enough from worry over Stiles that he wouldn't wrap the car around a tree. The werewolf reflexes were gone, and he could no longer drive like Mario Andretti on crack cocaine.

_Through this land of tragedy_

_ I try to find my way_

_ And in this town of misery_

_ I search for you_

_ Now we walk away to the last of the day._

For some reason, the last line of the song made the hair on the back of his neck prickle. He had a bad feeling about what was to come.

The howl had come from the outskirts of town, not far from the Hale property. Derek cruised up and down streets, looking for signs of boys, wolves or the silver Porsche that would help him track Stiles down. Bitterly, he cursed the loss of the wolf senses of smell and hearing that would have cut the time in half. Why did humans have such weak senses? It was amazing there were more than three people on the planet. Refusing to give up, he continued to search.

{}{}{}{}

Adrian Harris backed slowly away from the monster that his son had become. This was entirely unexpected. He had known there were werewolves in Beacon Hills for years, but had used warding spells to keep them from bothering him. An Alpha was a different matter, however. If he could make it to his bedroom, the wooden door (made from Mountain Ash) should be able to protect him. He had a few tricks that he could use, but they would require a few minutes to prepare.

The door burst open, and Harris was stunned to see the Stilinski boy, eyes glowing a bestial golden yellow with fangs and claws nearly matching the size of his pack leader's. Harris had always hated the fact that he had to suffer the boy's presence in his class. Not only was he an uncomfortable reminder of the past, but he was also abysmal at chemistry. The Alpha glared at the Beta, wordless communication passing between them. Harris could guess what they were saying to each other.

"_Fiat Lux!" _Harris shouted, making a complicated gesture in the air. A burst of light filled the room, blinding the light sensitive eyes of both werewolves. Harris fled to his room and slammed the door, racing to the pedestal where his most prized possession was displayed.

The Compendium of Alchemy.

This long lost work was a comprehensive encyclopedia that turned everything people thought about modern science inside out. The leather bound volume was the size of a phonebook, with thick creamy parchment pages covered in elegant Latin script. Harris had long ago indexed the pages with colored tabs, and flipped to the section on Protection Spells.

"Too long, too many steps, too many ingredients…ah, yes!" Harris opened a large metal cabinet and yanked out a few vials just as the first werewolf slammed into the door. He heard a strangled yelp as the power of the Mountain Ash repelled it's force. He heard one of the creatures leave the apartment, and Harris looked with horror at his window, which was totally unprotected. He hurriedly mixed the specified chemicals together, long experience eliminating the need for precise measuring. Just as the clawed arm of the young Stilinski boy smashed through the glass, Harris panicked and quickly shook the vial before tossing it to the floor at his feet. A minor explosion later, and he was gone in a cloud of sulfur smelling smoke.

The Beta vented its rage in a cheated howl, answered by the Alpha on the other side of the door.

Derek heard the howl, and quickly oriented on it down a small side street where he spotted Jackson's familiar silver Porsche.

His first urge was to run up the stairs, but he was in no position to deal with an enraged Alpha, or a Beta under his control. A glance up at a smashed window changed his mind however, and he cautiously made his way to the fire escape. Using a garbage pail to stand on, he grabbed the ladder and made his way over to the window, peering in. The sudden appearance of the glowing yellow eyes made him shout in surprise, and he almost tumbled backwards over the fire escape railing. A clawed hand grabbed his shirt and yanked him back just in time…and then pulled him into the dark room.

Stiles growled at him ferociously; though he was enraged at the escape of Harris, the wolf wanted to vent on any nearby target. Only the familiar scent of the one it recognized as it's mate prevented the wolf from attacking. Derek knew he was generating a fear scent, which just might provoke Stiles past the bounds of his endurance, so Derek tried a different tack. He concentrated fiercely on the recent memories of Stiles in that Catholic School outfit, and the precious few times they had given themselves over the raw passion they felt for each other. As Derek felt his own arousal grow, he knew his scent was changing to one laced with powerful pheromones that Stiles couldn't help but notice…and respond to. Slowly, Derek stripped off his jacket and shirt, and the shoes and jeans were next, his own desire obvious. A rope of drool hung from Stiles' mouth as he watched.

Stiles eyes burned, and the growling (though still predatory) changed its tone from rage to more of an expectant greedy lust. Stiles leapt on top of Derek, taking him to the floor. Derek allowed himself to be pinned, looking up with eyes that reflected the desire of the beast on top of him. Stiles straightened and drew one claw down the center of his own shirt and tore it in two, dropping the rag to the ground beside him. Derek unbuckled the boy's jeans and freed him, and Stiles quickly shrugged off the confining fabric. Then, to Derek's surprise, a clawed hand flipped him over.

"No fucking way-" was all he had time for before the beast descended and took him with all the force and fury of a runaway jackhammer.

In the other room, the Alpha jerked its head up as a human scream mixed with the sound of a triumphant howl emerged from the bedroom. The beast sniffed around, knowing that the enemy had gone from this place, and left no scent trail to follow. His cub was in there venting its rage and lust with its mate. With a cheated roar, the beast withdrew and within a minute left Jackson naked and unconscious on the apartment floor.

Stiles came back to himself and looked around. He was naked, as was the unconscious body of Derek underneath him. When Stiles moved, he felt himself _disengage_ from Derek, and was horrified to realize what he had done. There was a fair amount of blood, not to mention claw marks on Derek's back and hips…and the other damage. Stiles scooted backward until he hit a wall, and stared in horror. He made himself listen, and heard Derek's heartbeat strong and steady. He sighed with relief, although he was still disgusted with himself. He found his jeans and sneakers and put them back on, but tossed away the ruins of his t-shirt. It was one of his favorite bands, too. He tried the door to the bedroom and burned his hand on the knob.

"Shit!" he muttered. There was a bathroom nearby, and Stiles went in and filled his hands with cold water which he dumped on Derek's face. The shock woke him, and he gave a short agonized scream. He painfully rolled onto his back and lay there, staring up at the ceiling.

"Der, I am so sorry-" Stiles began, tears brimming from his eyes.

"It's all right Stiles. It's nothing that a good line of adult diapers won't fix."

Stiles lost it then, bawling into his hands. Derek sat up painfully; he had been joking, hoping to jolt Stiles out of his guilty mood, but it had backfired. He dressed slowly, then went to the bedroom door and opened it. He recognized the Mountain Ash that neither werewolf would be able to touch and wondered at who lived here and why Jackson had called Stiles here to destroy the resident. Speaking of Jackson, he was also naked and out cold on the floor. Derek repeated Stiles' wake up technique with water from the tiny kitchen sink.

Jackson woke up, and quickly realizing his state of undress sat up and hugged his knees.

Derek looked down at him, anger making him want to strike the teen, but his caution dictating otherwise. "Get in here, and tell us what's going on." Derek said coldly. He went back to the dark bedroom.

Jackson grabbed the tablecloth from a nearby table and awkwardly wrapped it around his waist before complying.

"Jackson? Oh my God, please, Derek's injured, you've got to give them to me, please, right now!" Stiles moaned from the floor.

"Okay, but this is getting old." Jackson joked half-heartedly, looking at the blood from the scratches on Derek's back soaking through the shirt. "Want me to just take them?"

Derek was so tempted to take Jackson up on that offer to pay him back for putting Stiles in danger that he actually opened his mouth to form the word "Deal!" when Stiles spoke again.

"Oh…Jackson, trust me when I say you don't want these." He needn't have bothered, because Jackson smelled the scent of sex in the air and blushed furiously, quickly adding up the facts and arriving at the correct conclusion.

"Aw, Derek, man I am so sorry for you…" he began.

Stiles jumped up. "Nevermind that! Trade, now! I get the injuries! Derek, say what you want!"

"Stiles, I don't need you to do that. I can handle it."

"Derek, if you don't do it, I swear I will never be able to look in a mirror again without feeling like I want to kill myself. For MY sake, please let me have them, if you love me at all you'll do it."

Derek stood silently, considering.

"Is it possible for me to take what I want later, and just leave it open for now?" he asked. Jackson nodded.

"Yeah, whatever you want Derek. I promise!" Stiles squeaked.

"Deal." The boys joined hands. Stiles shrieked and fell to the floor, a fresh set of tears (these from pain) pouring from his eyes, and he lay there quietly until the injuries faded. Derek felt the pain from his injuries leave, and wanted to moan with happiness, although he felt guilt ridden that he allowed Stiles to feel that hurt for even a minute.

"Now tell me what the _fuck_ this was all about." growled Derek when Stiles stood up again.

Jackson told them everything he learned from the Martins and from Harris. Derek's eyes widened in alarm at the news about Stiles' mother, and that Lydia would be claimed by a succubus within three days time.

"Jackson, thank you for calling me out here to get a piece of the bastard." Stiles said grimly. "We both have a score to settle with him."

"What kind of bullshit is that? Stiles, he put you in danger! Harris is a warlock, and you two could have been killed!" Derek was furious with both of them.

Jackson sneered at Derek. "Spoken like a true human. Have you forgotten what this means?" Jackson extended a claw and carved a spiral design into the nearby wall. It began to glow with an eerie red light.

Derek glared at him. "I've been a werewolf my whole life. You two have been at it less than a month. You're going to tell ME what a werewolf should do? Werewolves don't rush in half-cocked and put their entire packs in danger! An enemy like this takes time and planning, not to mention the fact that we also have an appointment with a demon in a few days! I don't know any way to fight that even with a hundred wolves!"

"Maybe there's something in here." Stiles pointed over to the book on the pedestal.

The three went to examine it, and Derek was stunned at what he saw.

"This book isn't even supposed to exist anymore. They burned all the copies in the Middle Ages. Shit, I can't read Latin."

"Lydia can." Said Jackson and Stiles together.

"The idea of Lydia with this book in her manicured claws worries me. I suppose we have no choice. We will have to go see her."

"They aren't releasing her from the hospital until tomorrow. We can see her tonight, if we hurry. She will have to know about what's going to happen to her too."

Derek grabbed the book off the pedestal and the three left the apartment. Jackson got into his Porsche (after pulling a fresh outfit from his trunk), while Derek and Stiles took the Camaro.

The car ride was mostly silent. Stiles' tears had dried, but he still could only look at Derek from the corner of his eyes.

"Stop thinking about it Stiles. What I did was risky, deliberately provoking you into sex when you were still angry about your prey escaping…I should have expected it. Hell, with a little preparation and…patience…on your part, it could have been fun."

Stiles looked at him wonderingly. "You mean you would have _let_ me do that?"

Derek looked at him with a puzzled expression. "Yeah, about five seconds after you let me know you were interested in doing it. I didn't know you'd want to. Why shouldn't I want to do whatever it takes to make you feel good? I'm in love with you, you nerd."

A thought occurred to Derek, and he snickered. "Did you think with all my macho Badass-ness I could only be an exclusive pitcher? Stiles, especially with werewolves, it's the catcher that's the really brave one."

Stiles thought about this in silence.

"I can't believe that Harris basically murdered my mother, committed rape in a bizarre way with Lydia's mother, and was going to allow Lydia herself to be taken by a demon. He makes the Alpha look like a jaywalker."

"My uncle had his reasons for doing what he did, not that that excuses him. But Harris…I don't know. I'm glad we have his book, but I worry what he may be up to."

Stiles shivered and hugged his arms across his bare chest. "How am I going to get into the hospital like this? I'm sure it's a 'No-Shirt, No Shoes, No Service' place.

Derek reached into the back seat and pulled out a box which he tossed to Stiles.

"I had this made as a gag gift. Hope you like it. Speaking of which, my shirt is kind of bloody so I'm going to put mine on too." They stopped the car, and Derek pulled a black t-shirt from a second box and switched it for his own. White letters on the front read "I'M NOT A WEREWOLF, BUT MY BOYFRIEND IS". Designs made to look like bloody claw marks were all over the shirt.

Stiles pulled out his shirt. It read simply "WEREWOLF", and had a stylized image of a snarling man-wolf on the front.

Stiles laughed hysterically over the two shirts. "I bet the Argents would get a kick out of this if they saw. You do realize these 'out' us in every possible way?"

"Well, I'm wearing my jacket over mine. People will just think you're a horror movie fan."

"Chicken." said Stiles good-naturedly. He went over and gave Derek a hug and a lengthy kiss that became dangerously close to something more before they regretfully pulled away and returned to the car. Derek was glad to see that Stiles' mood was completely back to normal.

Stiles held Derek's hand the rest of the way to the hospital, and allowed himself to forget for a little while about all of the problems they had to deal with. He pretended to himself that he was all alone in the world with Derek by his side on a road that stretched into infinity.


	6. Chapter 6

Derek and Stiles arrived at the hospital and made their way to Lydia's room. Stiles was overwhelmed at the odor of the roughly 6 dozen bouquets of flowers that filled the room from Lydia's family and friends who had received the happy news that she was recovered. Lydia was reading the "The Notebook" since she had no way to watch the movie, her face showing an open and vulnerable expression as she lost herself in the world of her beloved story. She looked up as the boys came in and quickly stowed the book out of sight.

"Hello, Derek. Hi…what was your name? Biles? Viles?"

"Stiles." he said through gritted teeth.

"Oh, I know that. I was just teasing. Thank you for trying to save me from that psychopath, I heard the whole story from Jackson. I guess the Formal didn't go the way any of us had planned. Nice shirt by the way."

"Well, things turned out okay in the end." Stiles pulled back Derek's jacket for a split second before Derek swatted his hand away, but Lydia was both a speed reader and an eidetic; she could recall perfectly anything that she had read in her entire life.

"Why, Stiles Stlinski, you little predator. Congratulations on bagging a hottie. If I didn't have Jackson, I'd be jealous."

Both Stiles and Derek rolled their eyes.

Jackson chose that moment to walk in, and blushed having heard that last comment.

"Yeah, Lydia, we need to talk about that…"

Over the course of the next twenty minutes, Lydia went from being angry to horrified, to amazed, then fearful and finally horrified again. The revelations were peppered with demonstrations of the boys' supernatural ability, so Lydia had no doubt that what they were telling her was true.

"So, I've been dating my brother, I'm the child of Harris and some she-devil, and 'Mommy' is coming to take me to Hell in three days? Could you guys have just left me in the coma? What the _hell_ am I supposed to do now?"

Derek handed her the Compendium.

"This is Harris' book on magic. It's what helped him cast the spells that caused all this trouble. You can read Latin, maybe you can find something in here that can help us help you."

Lydia looked down at the thick ancient volume in her hands, and opened the cover while studying the first page.

"Come back in an hour. I'll need to be left alone to do this right."

"An hour?" asked Derek in disbelief. It would take him weeks to read that thing, even if it were in English.

"You don't know Lydia. She usually doesn't take that long for a book. She must really want to get this one down. The only reason she even owns the paperback of 'The Notebook' is because she likes it too much to rely solely on her memory.

The boys stood guard over the room until at last she called them in.

"Derek, take this book and hide it where Harris will never find it. It can't be destroyed; I've already tried."

Derek took the volume back gravely.

"Won't you need it for any tricks you want to try?" he asked.

"Nope, got it all up here." She tapped her head. And let me tell you, there is some powerful juju in there. I'm guessing Harris didn't have the power or the guts to try anything really big or he would be impossible to handle. Me on the other hand…"

Lydia focused her crystal blue eyes on a nearby vase and whispered something under her breath. The vase shattered, spilling water and flowers onto the floor.

"I've just gone from bitch to witch, boys. Buckle your seat belts."

Jackson, Derek and Stiles looked at each other open-mouthed.

"Today begins a new era. No more hiding my light under a bushel. Now, let's hit that chemistry lab. I have something that will track down Harris, and we can deal with him permanently. He's mine."

"No, he's mine." Said all three boys at once. They looked at each other, and laughed. "Guess we aren't arguing about what his punishment needs to be. I'll share, just this once…after the bastard looks me in the face and tells me he was planning to sell me to a succubus." said Lydia.

Lydia discharged herself, and the gang headed to the school. Stiles and Derek went in the Camaro while Jackson and Lydia rode in the Porsche.

Jackson felt oddly shy looking at Lydia during the ride.

"So…sis." He began lamely.

"We didn't know Jackson. And it could have been so much worse. We should have suspected…we _were_ the prettiest people in the whole school."

"Don't call me pretty, I hate that."

"There are worse things to be called. Look at us now. Cambions. Alpha werewolf. Witch. Jackson…nothing in that book will help me destroy a succubus. They're immortal, only another full demon can do it... and then he or she would want payment as well. She will take one of us…there is no getting around that."

"So you're giving up?" he asked.

"Oh, I have a few ideas…but not very much faith. I'm…actually pretty scared." Her eyes narrowed. "But if I'm going…you better believe that I'm going to take Harris with me. He's going to be watching 'The Notebook' for all eternity…while on fire."

Jackson shuddered.

The school was completely empty when they arrived, and Lydia caused the locked doors to spring open with a negligent wave of her hands and a short spoken sing-song phrase. They found the lab, and Lydia was already at work mixing the exotic chemicals and storing the completed formulas in small vials when Derek and Stiles joined them. Lydia found a stone mixing bowl and poured a potion into it, adding a few hairs from a brush Harris kept in his desk. After some debased Arabic and bastardized Latinate phrases and some pre-Sumerian grunts, the mixture began to glow. Lydia's eyes turned white as she inhaled the vapors and freed her Sight to roam the town of Beacon Hills and locate the missing teacher.

"Um, Lydia, is there a way we can see what you're seeing?" asked Stiles.

Lydia furrowed her brow, then waved at the rolled up projection screen which promptly pulled itself down.

"By the blood of the Beast on the Pole and the Shell that is Cracked at the center of the World, may the Sight be Cast!"

The screen lit up with the image of all the streets and back alleys of Beacon Hills traveling by so swiftly that the group felt motion sickness. It stopped before a building very familiar to both Stiles and Derek.

"That's the Vet, Dr. Deaton…Scott's boss!" said Stiles.

The visual field phased through the door and into the back room where both Harris and Deaton were conversing silently.

"Sound! Sound!" said Jackson.

Lydia snapped her fingers.

"-ucking teenage werewolves running around trying to kill me!" said Harris.

"Calm down, Adrian. This is all your fault, you know. I told you to stay away from the dark stuff, and you never listened. This is what you get. I'm not sure what I can do to help you."

"They have…they have my book." Said Harris quietly.

"What book? The Grand Grimoire? The Delomelonicon? The Nuctemeron? You had one of those and didn't tell me, I'll kill you myself." Said Deaton jokingly, a half-smile on his face.

"The Compendium of Alchemy."

Deaton's smile disappeared.

"You had _that_ book all this time? Adrian, if that's the copy I think it is, the one owned by Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim Paracelsus…it's indestructible…which makes it one of the most dangerous books in existence. Do you know what could happen if the book fell into the hands of a witch or warlock with _real _power? _Like one of your Cambion offspring, perhaps?"_

Lydia smirked.

Deaton waved a hand, and Harris flew backward to smack hard against the wall, sinking slowly to the floor in a daze.

"_They could be watching us right now, you fool!"_ Deaton looked wildly around, and for one moment, all of them saw him look directly into the invisible 'camera' that was even now eavesdropping on their conversation.

Deaton looked down at Harris and wiped his sweating forehead with a towel.

"When does the succubus arrive?"

"Th-three…days." He choked out, a rivulet of blood pouring from one side of his mouth.

"That only deals with one of your problems. Then you've got your other child who is an Alpha werewolf, AND also the boy who's mother you indirectly killed – a Beta werewolf – and possibly McCall and Hale as well. I have half a mind to save me some trouble and turn you over to them myself."

"Help me…and you can have…my book."

Deaton considered.

"I won't help you kill anyone. Frankly, I think you deserve whatever they want to do to you. But if I can protect you…I will. I make no guarantees, mind you. I've got to get you out of here before they show up. Now, just in case anyone IS listening in…" Deaton tossed a handful of powder in the air. It flashed, and all four were momentarily blinded as the image faded from the screen. When they recovered, Stiles was the first to speak.

"How many warlocks and witches does this town have? We really ARE on a Hellmouth! I wonder if Scott knows he's been working for a sorcerer…"

"Deaton stopped my Uncle with Mountain Ash when he was after Scott…Peter told me about it, and I knew something was up with him...it isn't common knowledge for Veterinarians to have. Not to mention the night here at the school when he mysteriously disappeared and reappeared." put in Derek.

"Jackson, I need to go someplace private. I'm going to spend the night practicing some of the stuff I've learned." Lydia looked wan and tired. It seemed the magic took more energy out of her then she realized.

"Lydia…don't overdo it. I'll try to help you as much as I can. I promise I won't let anything happen to you."

Lydia looked at Stiles and smiled. The tiredness disappeared from her face leaving her radiantly beautiful once more, and for a moment, Stiles felt an echo of the old feelings he had for her before falling for Derek.

"I know you'll do your best to keep that promise. And Stiles…I'm sorry."

Derek moved closer to Stiles and put his hand on the younger boy's shoulder.

"You'd better take care of him when I'm gone, Hale. I have a feeling I will be ten times the bitch I am now when I become a succubus."

"You know I will, Lydia. But you aren't going anywhere you don't want to go."

"He's right. If worse comes to worst…I'll go in your place." Jackson said gruffly.

"WHAT?" said all three at once.

Jackson's eyes flashed crimson.

"You guys just never stop underestimating me, do you? You really think I'd let my own sister get taken to Hell if I could go in her place? In fact…I'll even make a deal out of it. I'll go…if you guys promise to finish off Harris if he happens to still be alive."

"That doesn't need to be a deal, Jackson. It goes without saying." Stiles said grimly.

"Thanks, Pack brother." Jackson smirked. When Stiles rolled his eyes, the teenage Alpha said "I hope you're not thinking some biting sarcasm."

"How about no sarcasm, but lots of biting?" They both chuckled.

"_No one is going with any succubus_." Derek said forcefully. "Except maybe Harris. Lydia, spend the night at my house. No one will bother you there. Tell your folks you are staying out late with Jackson." Derek told her. "We should all stick together until this is over anyway."

The four agreed and drove to Derek's house.

Lydia got out of Jackson's Porsche and looked at the burned shell of a dwelling.

"You're kidding me, right?" she said. Derek flushed.

"If my home isn't good enough for you…" he said.

"Lyd, not all of the rooms are that bad – " began Stiles.

He stopped as Lydia rolled up her sleeves. She took a vial from her purse and hurled it through one of the broken windows. Then she began to chant in a repetitive rhythmic pattern.

"_Pater Tempus, Retro Fugit_-" she began before the sound of her voice was cut off by a screaming wind. An iridescent bubble surrounded the house, and within that bubble, time seemed to be flowing backwards. The decay and rot retreated as they watched. Soon, the blackened boards exploded into silent flame which then grew smaller as the walls pieced themselves back together from nothing, the shattered windows knitting themselves whole. It was like watching a burning building in reverse as the fire seemed to construct the house rather than destroy it. When the last of the damage had been reversed, Lydia stopped her chant and fell to the ground, panting. The bubble disappeared, and the house stood in lonely splendor in the heart of the dark forest. Derek had tears flowing down his face as he looked at his restored home.

"Lydia…is…is my family…_in_ there?" he choked out. His voice literally broke at the end, and it suddenly struck all of them there how deeply the loss of his family must have hit him, and was still hitting him every day of his life. Stiles' heart broke looking at him, and even Jackson's eyes were getting moist.

Lydia looked like she wished the ground would swallow her up.

"Oh, Derek…no, nobody has _that_ kind of power. Shit, I thought I was doing you a favor, I never thought…"

Derek, the silent tears still flowing came over and pulled Lydia into a rough hug.

"I understand. Thank you. I never had the heart to tear the place down, it was all I had left to remember them by. I never fixed it up because it would be _different_. You gave it back to me the way it always was supposed to be. Come on. Let me show you around."

They walked inside, and all were struck silent for different reasons. Derek was lost in the memories of the past, seeing himself as a child running through the halls being chased by his sister Laura, running into the kitchen where his mother Diana would be cooking something whose aroma would make the wolf in him emerge even at that early age. He could practically see his father, Erick, working in his study for the Defenders of Wildlife Campaign to save the wolves in the national forests from being classified as predators and hunted to extinction. Uncle Peter would always be parked in front of the television following his own peculiar (for a werewolf) obsession…pro tennis. Derek's cousin Henry could always be seen in the backyard doing the gardening, often helped by his human longtime partner Michael as well as Edgar and Annie, the two toddlers they had adopted. Great Aunt Alice would often be sewing in the sitting room listening to old records of bands that were popular when she was a girl. Grandpa and Grandma Hale, werewolf immigrants from the Black Forest in Germany, who spent most of their days in the basement workshop tinkering with the cuckoo clocks they still invented and sold. They had fled here when the locals began to suspect what they were, hoping to find a place where they could live free from persecution in America. Roger Hale, Derek's older brother and his wife Janet, nearly six months pregnant and moving from room to room only with difficulty, her husband always holding her arm, his handsome face in a constant state of worry for her. Only Derek, Laura and Peter had survived that fire…and now Derek was all that was left. Their pictures, that hours ago had been a pile of ash, now sat on a beautiful sideboard in elegant frames. Derek studied them for a while before leading them through all the rooms. None of them were prepared for the fact that all of the family's possessions were intact and in place…as if the family had gone on an outing instead of being gone forever.

Stiles could not speak as he gained more of an insight into Derek than he ever had before, what kind of boy he was, how much he loved his family, what interests he had as a teenager. Derek's room was where he stayed the longest, looking at an electric guitar that he had never suspected existed in his mate's past. Stiles knew how he himself felt when he looked at anything that reminded him of his mother, and could only imagine what this was like for Derek.

Jackson felt his own empathy and liking for Derek grow at the exposure of this vulnerable side…Jackson knew well what it meant to have to show a tough exterior to the world while feeling like you were going crazy inside…he just had long assumed that surface-Derek was all there was. Before Derek knew what was happening, both Stiles and Jackson were hugging him from either side, which caused him to nearly break down completely as the jagged pieces of his despair suddenly tried to force themselves out of his soul and up through his throat in a howling cheated scream. The scream never came, but Derek's face turned a deep red and the tears were hot and fast…and they held him until it was over.

For Lydia (whose own experiences with her previously distant and seemingly uncaring parents she felt were nothing to what the boys had gone through), the idea that she had been hugely inconsiderate (in failing to predict the effect this would have on Derek) made her feel completely inhuman. She had really just wanted to avoid a night of exposure to the weather, and the reverse-time spell seemed appropriate. The boys looked at her, and gestured for her to join in the hug, to her surprise. She did, awkwardly at first, but then feeling (as they all suddenly did) that she had been given a new family to partially make up for the ones unfairly stolen from them.

Lydia stayed in Laura's room (a beautifully decorated room with artwork of forests, animals and nature indicating a woman at peace with the world around her) while Jackson stayed in Roger's. Derek and Stiles stayed awake for a while, and Stiles begged Derek to play something on his guitar.

"Stiles, the songs I practiced on were old…you probably never even heard of some of them."

"Don't care. Music, now."

Derek thought for a minute, then strummed his fingers across the strings as if he had never stopped practicing. His remarkably excellent singing voice made Stiles' heart stop in his chest. If he never loved Derek Hale before this moment, he would have fallen head over heels the moment the song began. Somehow, it was _so_ Derek.

"I see a bad moon rising.

I see trouble on the way.

I see earthquakes and lightnin'.

I see bad times today.

Don't go around tonight,

Well it's bound to take your life.

There's a bad moon on the rise."*

Derek didn't finish the song, as he was overcome by another wave of emotion. He put the guitar down gently, then pulled Stiles into his old teenage bed where they curled into each other, not giving completely in to their passions but rather comforting and holding, Stiles kissing away the tears every time they showed up until an exhausted and emotionally spent Derek fell deeply asleep. Stiles watched him in the darkness with glowing amber eyes, unaware that deep within Derek's sleeping mind…a sudden decision had been made.

*Thanks to Creedence Clearwater Revival for use of their awesome song.


	7. Chapter 7

The boys woke up early, although Lydia slept until noon (she had, as promised, stayed awake all night practicing some of the spells she learned). They were ravenously hungry, so Jackson went off to a diner to purchase as much food as his credit card would allow and bring it back to the house. While Derek and Stiles had some time alone, Derek sat him on the Louis XVI sofa in the sitting room and informed him of his decision.

"Stiles…I've been thinking about it…and I've decided I'm going to be a werewolf again. Seeing my home the way it was made me realize that I have no call to spurn my family heritage. We go back a long way, and have every right to be proud of who we are. I can't even believe for a minute that I wanted to give it up…my mother and father…my brother and sister…I'll never be half the werewolves they were. I was lucky to be part of the Hale bloodline…I want to be a part of it again, the way it was meant to be."

"You're going to need Jackson either way. He's the Alpha and would have to be the one to bite you…which means you'd have to follow his lead. Or are you going to ask him to trade it back? Or…" Stiles paled. "…do you want to take it from me? I never did pay you for that old deal. If you ask for it, it'll come to you."

"I thought about it. But you don't seem to be having the problems with it that Scott had…except for Jackson calling you out to kill…and the Ms. Pac-Man machine…and when you pretty much used me like a blow up doll…and-"

"If you don't shut up, I'm going to suck out your eyeballs, and spit them down your throat." Stiles tried to glare, but he was red-faced and could not meet Derek's gaze.

Derek chuckled. "Nice try. Your threats are getting better, though. Look, in all of those situations, you were _provoked_ Stiles. But you've never done anything…out of control on your own. You aren't a bad werewolf. What do you think? Do you like being this way?"

Derek's gaze was intense as he waited for Stiles to answer. Stiles knew that that a lot rode on this, so he tried to be as honest as he could.

"As a human…I never realized how scared I was all the time. Of getting hurt, of feeling helpless. I'm still afraid now, but for different reasons. I'm afraid of hurting other people…of hurting you. You want the truth? I like being a werewolf…but if it meant hurting you I'd give it up this instant."

Derek let out a shaky breath.

"If you wanted to be human again…I don't know if there could have been a future for us. But I wanted you to make that decision without thinking of me."

"What the hell do you mean?"

"It means that I know I'll feel a lot better if I don't have to worry about hurting _you._ I don't know if I would be able to live with the worry or, god forbid, guilt if something did happen. I'd be in the same boat I was in before this started."

"It'll be nice being on an even playing field for once. Can you imagine what it will be like if when we're both-" began Stiles, flushing again.

"Don't even get me started down that road, or I'll attack you right now." Derek said, looking hungrily at Stiles, the old shadow of the wolf flashing across his face.

"Bring it on, tough guy." growled Stiles, reaching forward to grab Derek's t-shirt in clawed fingers.

"Please don't, I don't want my last sight on Earth to be wolf-on-boy action. You have a bedroom you know." Lydia had just walked in the door, yawning and stretching.

"You have one too, Lydia. You might consider walking there now. In fact, you may even want to run." growled Derek, the pain of frustration visible all over his face.

"Don't make me try out the 'permanent impotence' spell, Derek." said Lydia blithely as she ran her fingers along the spines of the books on the shelves.

"Geez, Lydia, tell me you're kidding!" choked Stiles, horrified.

"Come at me and find out." she said, smiling evilly. Her heart rate was perfectly even throughout the entire exchange.

"We should never have given her that book!" moaned Stiles.

Derek mastered himself with some effort.

"She's right. Let's focus on our top priorities-"

"Fine with me." Stiles got up and yanked Derek to his feet (he gave a startled yelp) and dragged him back to the older boy's bedroom, and Lydia heard the sound of a door slamming.

"DON'T WORRY ABOUT ME, I'LL MAKE MYSELF AT HOME!" shouted Lydia before heading into the front hall. Jackson pushed open the front door at that moment burdened with steaming orders of breakfast takeout. Lydia, being her usual helpful self, pointed the way into the dining room without offering to relieve him of the food.

"At least get the door!" Jackson gasped out.

Lydia glared at the door, which slowly swung shut. Jackson rolled his eyes, but managed to get the food onto the table where Lydia deigned to help him set out the paper place settings.

"Where are the lovebirds?" asked Jackson.

Another yelp from Derek followed by a crashing sound came from upstairs, answering his question.

"Breaking some furniture and a few laws of nature. They'll be a while." said Lydia in a bored voice.

Jackson chuckled.

"Let's eat."

They ate their fill, but Jackson remained quiet for almost ten minutes before Lydia demanded to know what he was thinking about.

"I think…I'm going to ask Derek to take back being an Alpha."

"I thought you wanted to be a werewolf!" exclaimed Lydia.

"I did, I do! But Derek's supposed to be the Alpha, and I really haven't done a good job of learning any control yet. The training session I had with Derek basically involved me hurting him when I even shifted partway. I just don't have what it takes to control this much power. I'd settle for being a Beta and learning from him, he's been one his whole life and I was an idiot to think I could do a better job. I've only changed fully twice, and I put my friends in danger both times. I don't want the responsibility anymore. What's coming is just too important for the Alpha role to be in the hands of a rookie."

"I'm glad to hear you say that, Jackson." Said Derek coming into the room. Under his tee-shirt they could see the outlines of bandages with a bit of blood seeping out from under them. "Um…if you wanted to trade back…say, nowish…I'd be okay with that." Derek sat in a chair somewhat painfully and began to dig into the now lukewarm food.

"I don't want to be human though, Derek." said Jackson.

"You were never human. You just weren't a werewolf. Cambions can't be turned by bite anyway, Lydia proved that; if I bit you that first night you asked for it, you would have been in a coma next to her in the hospital. It has to be traded…which means that if you want to be a Beta…you are going to have to bite me before we switch."

"What? Derek, I can't! I can barely control myself even partly shifted! I'll wind up taking your head off!"

"He's right, Derek." Stiles wandered in fresh from a shower. "Derek, take my wolf away, and then you trade with Jackson. Then you can bite me and give me my own wolf. You won't take _my_ head off, right cuddlekins?" Stiles pinched Derek's cheek.

"Only if you ever dare to do that again." grated Derek. "Fine. Stiles, I claim your wolf as payment from our last deal."

Stiles fainted just at the moment he was drinking milk (directly from the quart container) and fell to the floor nearly drowning himself in the dairy beverage. Derek felt brief nausea, followed by the return of his old and familiar companion. He quietly reveled in it for a brief moment before helping a coughing and spluttering Stiles to his feet.

"Not cool, Derek! And I just showered too!" The other three laughed, Lydia loudest of all. Derek and Jackson formally traded then, and Derek was once more the Alpha of the Hale pack. When Derek straightened up from this second bout of nausea, he gave them all a glare not seen on his face since all of this started. His entire demeanor changed subtly, and it was obvious that his Badass-ness had returned as well.

"Stiles." Said Derek in a quiet, dangerous voice. "We have some unfinished business to take care of."

Stiles' grin faded away and he felt the return of the same old anxiety he had felt around Derek since he first met him.

"Um, you mean the bite?" his voice cracked on the last syllable.

Derek smiled chillingly.

"Yes. That too." And then it was Stiles' turn to be grabbed and dragged from the room, the bedroom door slamming for the second time that day. The new yelps were higher pitched than before too.

"All right, this is getting sick." Lydia joked, jumping at the end when the sound of something heavy slamming into the floor made the whole house shake.

"It's Derek's last chance to be the Alpha…in the bedroom at least." chuckled Jackson.

The doorbell rang at that instant, and Lydia (without thinking) gave it a passing glance from her chair which caused it to swing open. A stunned Scott stood there, trying to see who had opened the door.

"Guys. What the HELL is going on here? Lydia? You're awake? What happened to this house? Jackson? Where are Stiles and Derek?" He ran out of breath after this flurry of questions and had to take a honk of his hated inhaler…a forgotten aspect of becoming human again that he bitterly had to reacquaint himself with.

"Derek and Stiles are doing what animals usually do…on the Discovery channel." Lydia leafed through 'The Notebook' in an attempt to keep herself occupied.

"WHAT?"

Jackson covered his face with his hands. "Nice work, Lydia. Scott didn't know yet."

"Oops."

"Get in here, McCall. We have a lot to catch you up on."

By the end of the rehashing of their adventures since Scott had been made human, the ex-werewolf was speechless as he struggled to absorb one amazing revelation after another. Finally:

"So…Stiles and Derek are gay?"

"Jesus, Scott, THAT'S the one thing you can't wrap your head around? I don't know what they are! I get the feeling they might be bi or something, but you have to ask them…if you absolutely HAVE to know." Jackson shook his head at Scott's ignorance.

"Stiles is my best friend! I thought he would have told _me_ of all people! I mean, Danny told you right away, so why wouldn't Stiles tell me that he was an 'anything that moves' kind of guy."

Even Lydia was impressed with his tactlessness.

"What was he supposed to tell you Scott? 'Gee, I just realized everybody looks the same facedown?' Grow up. Wait until you're in college; I always thought you looked like you were three beers away from your first gay encounter."

Jackson burst out laughing while Scott brayed a stunned "WHAT?" at the top of his voice.

"I wouldn't laugh too hard, Jackson. Danny told me that the first time you guys played 'Doctor' was with each other." said Lydia spitefully.

"Oh, please, we were freaking twelve."

"Really? He said you were fourteen."

"Listen, can we change the subject?" Jackson said glaring at an amused Scott.

"No, please continue. Which one of you was the 'Doctor' Jackson?" asked Derek coming into the room. His bandages from earlier were gone from underneath the t-shirt, his aura of menace back in full force as shown by the sudden quiet in the room.

"Um, we took turns. Where's Stiles?"

"Upstairs recovering. He'll probably turn by midnight or so. What are you doing here Scott?"

"I know this is going to sound lame…but I want it back." he said, looking down at the floor.

Derek choked on a mouthful of water.

"What? Why?"

"When I turned the first time, I was more upset that I didn't get a choice than anything else…and that it interfered so much in my life. I didn't realize how many ways it helped me…like this for instance." He held up the inhaler. "The asthma's ten times worse than before. I get tired walking from one room to another. I'm a klutz again. My friends are all werewolves or witches or whatever and I'm left out. You guys are having a battle with a demon in two days and I can't even help you fight."

"Would you help us? Even if it meant risking your life?" Derek asked, listening closely to the boy's heartbeat.

"Are you nuts? Of course I would! For ANY one of you!" He was telling the complete truth as far as Derek could tell.

"Well, not all of your reasons are selfish, at least. I can bring you back into the Pack, Scott. But there'd be no going back this time. And you would definitely have to be a bit more receptive to my authority. You sure this is what you want?"

Scott hesitated…then nodded once.

"Okay, out in the yard. I don't want your blood everywhere." said Derek in a bored voice.

Looking suddenly scared, Scott went quickly outside with Derek following close behind.

"Another warrior for the showdown." Jackson mused.

"Really? I thought the plan would be to make Scott fight on _her_ side. We'd be sure to win then."

Jackson snorted.

"_Aaaaaaarrrrrrggggghhhhhhhhh!" _came a bloodcurdling scream from outside, suddenly cut off.

Jackson yawned. "Is there a TV in this house? I feel like a nap after this huge meal."

"Yeah, but it's not hooked up to cable, and I don't know how to use witchcraft to compromise satellites yet. The radios work though. All the sofas are really comfortable too." Lydia was once again absorbed in her book.

Derek walked in carrying an unconscious Scott. Scott's t-shirt had been removed and was now bunched up and pressed against a bleeding shoulder. Derek shifted Scott and carried him up the stairs, Scott's inhaler falling to the floor in the process.

"Somebody chuck that, will you?" Derek called from the top of the stairs.

{}{}{}{}

Stiles and Scott lay recovering from their werewolf bites together. Stiles was on the bed, Scott dumped unceremoniously on the floor. Stiles painfully tossed him a pillow and a blanket.

"Hey bro. Or should I say 'Pack Bro'." joked Stiles.

"You could have told me, Stiles." said Scott sullenly.

"You had other things going on…and these feelings are pretty new, Scott. I didn't want to bother you or freak you out. I was more worried about you freaking that it was _Derek_, not guys in general."

"Yeah…why him? He was always so mean to you. Hey! He was mean to me, too! Does he want _my_ ass?"

Stiles clobbered Scott with a pillow, then hissed as his bite began to bleed again.

"MY ass is all he needs! God, did I really just say that?" Stiles flushed red.

Scott chuckled. "Just busting on you. But seriously? What gives?"

"He says he did it to drive me away so he wouldn't hurt me or some nonsense. I didn't like when he did that stuff, but I always knew there was something underneath…somebody really special. I've seen a side of him over the past few days while he was human that you would never believe. That's the guy I'm in love with…the Badass werewolf stuff is sexy, but oh my God if he played the guitar for me just once a day, I'd be his slave for life."

Scott made retching sounds.

"Screw you. I love that I'm the only one now that gets to see it…like I have my own special Derek."

"God, was I this way with Allison? No wonder you guys hated us."

"Dude, you were worse. My username and password aren't 'Derek' bro."

"No, it's 'Thundercat'. Says a lot now that I think about it. Guess you were always into bestiality."

Scott was clobbered more carefully this time.

"I'm back with Allison again."

"WHAT?" shrieked Stiles.

"Yeah, she showed up at my house to freak out at me over the breakup, and we got to talking…and well we're back on. We're taking it slow this time though."

"Well, that's good at least. I knew even Jackson's demonic Cambion powers couldn't keep her away forever. It's even odds she's some sort of supernatural being too. Maybe a fairy."

Scott opened his mouth to speak, but Stiles cut him off.

"Dude, if you say 'I thought you were the fairy, Stiles.' I will totally tell Derek and he'll make you _eat_ this pillow."

Scott laughed out loud, and after a moment Stiles joined him.

"So what do you think about Deaton helping out Harris? Did you suspect he was into weird stuff before all this happened?"

"There were a lot of weird things that happened, but I just never saw any connection until now. He was always a great boss to me though. From what Jackson told me, Deaton doesn't like what Harris has been up to. I hope we can get him to switch sides. For someone who is going to be kidnapped by a succubus in two days, Lydia doesn't seem too worried."

"Jackson offered to go in her place if we can't stop the demon in any other way."

Scott was shocked. "Well, we need to stop her in another way."

"That's the plan."

"It's cool we are doing this together…not like the first time. I'm sorry for everything I put you through when I was having trouble adjusting…plus everything you did for me. I know I wasn't a very good friend to you."

Stiles was quiet for a minute. "You were having…a tough time."

"Don't make excuses for me. It was another revelation I had being human, how much it must have sucked for you playing sidekick to me with my amazing wolfy superpowers. I still remember that day you were going to head out onto the LaCrosse field for the first goddamn time ever, and I stopped you so I could get back at Jackson. You've never had a chance since then…I took that away from you. How can you even stand being in the same room with me?"

"Scott…it's really not that big a deal. Yeah, I wanted to play. And yeah, I was pissed at a lot of things. But I can't really complain at how things turned out. I will be playing some killer LaCrosse next year, and if you get in my way again, I'll get my boyfriend to eat you."

"You seem to think you can get Derek to do a lot of things."

"That's 'cause I got mad skills, yo."

"Ok, stop sending me that image or I am seriously going to ralph."

"Yeah? Let me tell you what we've tried so far. The first time we had sex, we-"

"LALALALALALALALA" Scott shouted, hands over his ears.

After a while, both boys fell asleep. They awoke in the early hours of the morning to the sound of a low gentle snoring, whose source turned out to be Derek. He had climbed into bed and lay facing the wall. Stiles and Scott got up quietly and exited the room, heading downstairs to raid the fridge for leftovers. They ate ravenously, checked their shoulders (the bite marks were gone) and high fived. Jackson and Lydia were locked away in their rooms, and neither boy felt like waking up a sleeping Derek, so they decided to go for a run in the forest to work off some of the excess energy shooting through their bodies. As children, Stiles had always been able to outrun Scott due to his asthma, and then Scott completely leapfrogged Stiles during his first stint as a werewolf. Now, for the first time, they were evenly matched and tore through the dark woods with glowing amber eyes faster than any human could dream of, laughing like lunatics.

The full Beta shift had taken over their bodies, and after the lengthy chase they tackled each other at the same time playfully clawing and biting like two pups in a litter uncaring about the fleeting and superficial wounds they inflicted on each other. They eventually gave up in exhaustion, Scott especially reveling in the return of his powerful lungs as he lay panting on the forest floor and staring up at the starry expanse of sky and the bloated pregnant moon hanging above them. He could not remember feeling so content since before his father had left the home.

Stiles lay there lost in his own thoughts as well, though from his furtive glances back in the direction of the house, it was obvious that he was thinking of his mate and what future lay before them after the coming crisis was over.

A faint sizzling sound in the air was all the warning the two got before bands of purple force riveted their bodies to the forest floor.

"Shit! What the hell?" Scott screamed. An explosion of smoke later, and Adrian Harris stepped forward from the cloud to stare grimly down at the two trapped werewolves.

"Hell, indeed McCall. This should be familiar to you; it's called 'Detention'. In other words, you will be _detained_ here until I leave. Then you can go back and tell the rest of the pound puppies that _I want my blasted book back._ If I don't get it, I will begin to teach young Stilinski here what the power of chemistry can _really_ do when applied in just the right fashion. Sort of makes you wish you'd paid more attention in class, doesn't it? Abysmal students, both of you. And tell my daughter that her mother is _very anxious_ to meet her after such a long absence. They'll have all eternity to catch up on old times. Farewell!"

Harris stood over a terrified Stiles and hurled a vial to the ground. The two disappeared in another cloud of smoke. About ten seconds later, the purple bands of force disappeared and Scott got slowly to his feet. More than Harris, more than the succubus, and more than anything else he had faced in his young life did the young werewolf dread the idea of going back to the Hale home and telling Derek that yet again someone he loved more than life had been taken from him.


	8. Chapter 8

Scott didn't have to worry about waking Derek, the Alpha werewolf was already awake and standing in front of the house, arms folded and breath steaming in the chill air. His Glare was at full 1,000 Gigawatt capacity, and Scott wilted before it, suddenly wishing he had stayed at home that day and really attempted to make friends with his inhaler.

"I woke up and you guys were gone. Where's Stiles?" asked Derek immediately.

"Um..uh…er…oh God, I'm _so _dead…Derek, Stiles and I went out for a run, and Harris came for us. He tied us up with magic and disappeared with Stiles; he wants his book back or he says he…"

Derek's brows drew together, and there seemed to be a crimson thunderstorm going on in his eyes. His t-shirt suddenly began to look too tight.

"_Go on, Scott. What did he say he'll do?"_

"He said…he said he's going to do chemistry on him!" Scott shrieked, putting his arms over his face and falling into a defensive kneeling position.

"Oh, for the love of…Scott, get up! I'm not going to hurt _you_, or not tonight anyway. Go wake Jackson and Lydia, I'll get the book from where I hid it."

Scott dared to peek, but Derek was already striding away to one of the underground cellar entrances that crisscrossed underneath the Hale home. Sighing with relief, he went into the house and raced up the stairs. Jackson was awake, but sleep fogged as he made his way back to his room from the guest bath. Scott took a moment to goggle at the serious case of bedhead (Jackson apparently forgot to wash the product out of his hair before he went to sleep) and the cute howling wolves that decorated his boxers.

"What's up?"

"Seriously? Wolf-boxers?"

"I got werewolf pride. Get over it. Why do you look so spazzed out?"

"Harris has Stiles. He wants his book back, and Derek went to go get it. We need to wake Lydia and go after him!"

Jackson's eyes opened wide. "Oh, shit. I wouldn't want to be Harris. I'll get dressed." He came back a minute later in jeans and a black t-shirt that read 'Got Lycan?' A baseball cap with yet another snarling wolf on it covered his wild hair.

Scott shook his head.

"You…are a freak."

They knocked on Lydia's door and heard her yawn.

"Okay, whoever just woke me, you are going to spend the next ten years hoping desperately that a princess kisses you."

She opened the door a crack and spotted the boys. Her hair was disheveled, and she blinked rapidly as she fastened her ivory nightgown shut. Lydia looked at Jackson's outfit steadily. "Now I _know_ this is a bad dream."

"It isn't. Harris kidnapped Stiles. We're going after him. Get ready, and don't take forever." Said Jackson, pointedly ignoring her remark.

She came awake fully.

"Just a sec." She closed the door and after a second, a puff of smoke came out from under it. The door opened and Lydia stood there fully dressed, make-up and hair perfect as if she had just completed her usual two hour routine.

"Oh my god, could you please teach Allison that spell? And my mother, and maybe all the girls at school?" said an awed Scott.

The three went downstairs just as Derek came in with the Compendium in hand.

"Glad you three are ready…" Derek trailed off looking at Jackson. "Okay, you are never to wear anything like that around another werewolf for the rest of your life."

Jackson rolled his eyes. Derek turned to Lydia.

"Lydia, can you track Stiles? Where would Harris take him?"

"Yeah, I put some magical GPS voodoo on you all. The old kidnapping trick is so predictable. I'm betting he took Stiles to the chemistry lab at school, though."

She closed her eyes and concentrated.

"Yep. And we need to go, now. Stiles is in trouble."

Derek's brows shot up. "Okay, everybody in the Camaro-"

"No need. Gather round." Lydia took out a vial and smashed it into the center of the small group. The smell of rotten eggs surrounded them, and when the smoke cleared, they found themselves in the familiar lab at the school. Stiles was strapped by the bands of purple force to the heavy marble lab table while Harris stood over him with a glass pipette in one hand and a large brown bottle bearing a simple chemical formula. "Hydrochloric Acid" was printed underneath in small letters. The smell of burned flesh filled the room, and Derek noticed that Stiles' clothing had numerous burn holes in it. The flesh underneath was scabbed as his body struggled to heal itself. Stiles' face was beet red, as were his eyes which poured a continuous stream of tears.

"D-derek…" he shouted in a shuddering broken voice.

_"Oh, you bastard!"_ shouted Derek in an inhuman voice. Derek leapt into the air, the transformation ripping its way through his body in mid-flight. The gaping jaws were less than six inches from an unconcerned Harris when there was a sizzling sound and suddenly Derek was veering off to the left to slam into a wall before sliding down to the floor. The Compendium lay forgotten on the floor, dropped as soon as Derek began the change.

"Simpleton!" muttered Harris. The rest of the gang looked down and noticed the circle of sawdust that surrounded both Harris and the lab table. An inner ring of intricate runes drawn in a suspicious red ink made Lydia's eyes widen.

"The runes negate magic activated outside its boundaries, and three guesses what tree that sawdust comes from, mutts. Now, hand me the book."

Scott and Jackson's eyes were glowing amber. Lydia's had turned a dead black. She snapped her fingers and the book rose from the floor to float over her outstretched hand where it revolved in the air, her fingers moving in a rhythmic pattern beneath it.

Harris' eyes widened.

"Impressive. I must say, I have always been impressed with both my children. My son seems to have thrown in his lot with the wolves, but you my dear begin to seriously intrigue me. Maybe I will have dear Lilith take _him_ instead of you. With your power and my experience-"

"This really DOES play out like in the movies, doesn't it? This is the part where the villain offers to let one of the heroes join with him, although everybody knows they never agree to it! You don't really think for a minute I would say yes, do you?"

Harris shrugged. "It was worth a shot."

"Let Stiles go, 'Dad'." growled Jackson.

Harris put down the acid and pipette and took out a gun.

"Son, you have been both disobedient and naughty. I am afraid you will have to be taught a lesson." He waved one hand over the gun.

"_Le balle de plomb…le balle argent!"_ he chanted. A bright violet flash emanated from the gun. Lydia stiffened.

"If you could change lead into silver, why were you so broke?" she asked.

Harris' smile slipped. "It…only lasts an hour. Nevermind that! Give me the book or I will shoot your canine companions right after I pour the bulk of this acid over young Stilinsky's face." He poured another bottle into the acid with the help of a small funnel.

"The silver nitrate I've just added will make sure the damage is lethal and permanent."

"Lydia…give it to him." They turned to see Derek, human once more, sit up painfully.

"He'll kill us Derek." whispered Scott.

Jackson nodded his head. "Scott's right, Derek."

"Nonsense. I'll have to leave my children alive for their…appointment. Unlike you, Stilinsky, their mother is returning for them. I never did apologize for sacrificing the dear Sheriff's wife…why was that? Oh, yes. I didn't care."

At his words, Stiles suddenly stopped crying, and he Glared at Harris in a way that would have made Derek proud.

"My mother loved me you sick fuck, loved me more than anything else in the world. Not like you or your devil-bitch…Jackson and Lydia deserved better than you. Know something? Everybody thinks my dad was the tough one…because he was the Sheriff. You've never seen my mother in action. A pit bull got away from its owner and tried to attack me when I was a kid, and when I screamed for her she came running out and kicked the crap out of it before it could touch me. Then she did the same to the guy who owned it. If there were anybody in the world that could come back…it would be her. And you would be in deep shit."

"Oh, I'm terrified. Too bad that from everything I've read, the dead can never return."

They all looked around, suddenly aware that if they were in a movie, this would be the precise point where the vengeful ghost made an appearance and rescued them all.

Nothing happened.

"Told you so." Harris grinned. "Book, now!"

Lydia sent the book floating over to Harris. His greedy eyes roamed the cover of the book before opening it to a random page.

An explosion of fire roared up out of the book, and Harris screamed. He quickly turned on the lab sink and dunked his head under the cold water.

He straightened up, most of his hair gone and the flesh of his cheeks and forehead blistering while they watched.

Disgustingly, he grinned.

"Clever girl…I didn't even notice you fire-trapping that book while you were floating it, letting _me_ activate its power from within the circle. But the book is unharmed, and I will restore myself with it…as soon as I deal with all of you. Stilinsky…it's time for your first acid trip!"

"_No!_" shouted Derek weakly from the floor.

The three werewolves and the lone witch watched helplessly as Harris lifted the bottle and prepared to pour it over Stiles' face. Stiles turned his face to the side and squeezed his eyes shut, the tears starting again. Then he hitched in a great breath.

"MOOOOOOMMMMMMMMM!" he shouted at the top of his lungs.

The windows of the lab crashed inward as a gale force wind blew them from their frames. The wind caught Harris off guard and he stumbled backward still holding the bottle of acid until he hit the chalk board behind him. The bottle bounced out of his fingers and shattered onto the floor where its contents began to dissolve it, along with the magic circle and Harris' feet. His screams were terrible to hear.

Lydia began to chant in a long dead tongue and Harris rose into the air where he was surrounded by an iridescent bubble. The reverse time spell worked on him and healed all of the damage he had suffered from both the fire-trapped book and the acid. Soon he was restored to perfect health. He looked down at himself, amazed.

"You…you saved me!" he gasped.

"Yeah. For them. Dying only once is too good for you."

And so, all four of the werewolves had a chance to nearly murder Harris, with Lydia pulling him back from death (which was irreversible even with this spell) at the last possible moment. Jackson used his claws to slash his throat, then Scott went for a disembowelment that left Harris' intestines hanging to the floor. Stiles, once Lydia released him, pulled out his tongue and then ripped off his lower jaw after sending both thumb-claws into his eyes. Harris was incoherent with pain as he was restored the final time, and the others left the room so that a recovered and re-transformed Derek could take his final vengeance in private. Somehow, they were sure that whatever he had in his mind to do to the warlock, it would be gruesome enough to make even them have nightmares.

When the screams stopped as well as the moist ripping sounds, the chomping sounds, the crunching sounds and the belching sounds, they came back in to find no trace of the warlock to deface the earth with its presence.

Derek was washing up at the lab sink, the table hiding his nakedness from the others. He whistled as he scrubbed off the blood that covered him, which was even caked in his hair. He washed as thoroughly as he could while Lydia reversed the damage done to his clothes. Stiles went over and handed them to him, and they shared a brief kiss before he dressed. Lydia grabbed the Compendium and stuffed it into her bag. They left the lab a second time, and Derek looked at Jackson before carving a spiral design into the door with his index claw. The spiral began to glow crimson.

Lydia squinted at it. "How the hell does that work?"

Derek shrugged. "Cool werewolf magic. No idea. Only Alphas can do it, in places associated with someone they either want to kill or have killed. It serves as a warning to our enemies."

"Guys…do you think that wind was from…my Mom?" asked Stiles quietly.

They all shrugged.

"Could have been a coincidence. Freak occurrence. Bad luck. Or her. At this point, I no longer doubt the existence of any supernatural being." Derek said, putting his arm around him.

"Mom…if that was you…thank you. I love you." Said Stiles solemnly, eyes shut. Stiles was not the only one who noticed the faint scent of jasmine then, at completely the wrong time of year. He was the only one who knew, however, that it was also the scent of her favorite perfume.

Lydia conjured them home again, and they each went to their bedrooms (Scott was evicted from Derek's room, so he bunked down in Peter Hale's old room). Derek and Stiles showered together, not so much to get clean as to let the hot water wash away the fear for each other that had haunted the last few hours of their existence. They put on robes and Derek led Stiles down to the finished basement which contained a Jaccuzzi that was (amazingly) filled with clean water. Lydia's magic thought of everything.

Stiles leaned back against Derek in the swirling bubbling water while his mate slowly massaged the tension from his shoulders, their bodies sliding against each other in pleasurable anticipation. Derek moved on to the chest, rubbing it in ever-widening circles while Stiles gave himself over to the raw animal sensations it provided him, eyes closed and mouth open wide. He didn't object as Derek reached further beneath the water and took Stiles in hand while at the same time pressing his own persistent manhood slowly and forcefully deep into his mate's body. Their movements synced up perfectly, and soon Stiles was gasping as he rocked with the sudden release of tension, Derek biting none too gently into his shoulder. They lay there, both growling low and deep in their chests, glowing amber and crimson eyes winking in the dark. Stiles turned around and put his arms around Derek's neck, pulling himself slowly up the older teen's body until, straddling his mate, he was able to explore Derek's mouth with an insistent tongue for an incredibly short hour or two until the sun finally began to rise. They left the Jaccuzzi and dried each other off before retiring back to Derek's bedroom. They slept with Derek's arm curled tightly, protectively (and if Stiles had been human, crushingly) around Stiles' chest as if afraid to let him go.

In their dreams, they chased each other, sometimes as naked humans and others as monstrous wolves through a huge and primordial forest, the only beings in that whole green world.

It was noon when they woke, a little breathless as if the chase from their dreams had been real and went downstairs.

A new selection of food awaited them, this time burgers, fries, fried chicken and just about every type of unhealthy fast food imaginable. The food drew Stiles like a piranha to a goldfish. He shoveled food into his mouth as if it were about to be snatched away.

"Let me guess, Scott picked it up." Said Derek, eyeing the cholesterol chocked feast.

"Correct in one. He got me a salad at least." Lydia was reading the fashion section of a newspaper.

"Where _are_ those two chuckleheads?" asked Derek, swigging some orange juice.

"Down in the Jaccuzzi."

Derek choked on the acidic juice, while Stiles nearly regurgitated his burger with a barked laugh.

It took Lydia's Mensa qualified mind a nanosecond to figure things out.

"Ahhh, to tell them, or not to tell them. That is the question."

"No, the question is _when_ to tell them." gasped Stiles.

The wet pads of feet sounded in the kitchen as Jackson and Scott appeared still dripping wet. Stiles again almost choked on his burger at the sight of them. Scott wore a Beacon Hills Swim Team bathing suit, while Jackson's had little crescent moons all over it.

"Tell us what?" asked Scott.

"That if I fell into that Jaccuzzi, I'd probably get pregnant with Stiles' and Derek's children." said Lydia blithely.

A second later and horrified comprehension dawned on their faces and they each rushed to a different bathroom for the scrubbings of their lives.

"That, Lydia, was cruel." Said Derek, smirking.

"Well, it could be my last day on earth so I'd like to enjoy it. Tomorrow's the big day. Family reunion time."

"It's not going to happen. Harris and that book both said the dead couldn't return, and I know that my mother saved me last night. They say a demon can't be beaten, I say it can. We just have to figure out how." Stiles sounded 100% confident, and Lydia gave him a small smile.

"I think that today we need to have a conversation with Scott's boss. He may know something that could help us." Derek said quietly.

"Why should he help us? We killed his warlock buddy." Stiles breathed around his last mouthful of food.

"The usual three options. Threats, bribes or common decency." Derek looked grim. "I hope its Option 1, but the book might work for 2."

"Sounds like a plan. When the boys are finished washing up, I'll see if we can track him down." Lydia disappeared behind the paper once more. Derek inspected the food Stiles hadn't demolished before turning his nose up at the lot.

"Not hungry?" asked a concerned Stiles.

"Still full from last night." Derek patted his slightly bloated stomach.


	9. Chapter 9

Lydia confirmed that Deaton was at his veterinary clinic, but was either asleep or unconscious. She offered to 'BAMF' them there (as Stiles put it), but Derek was coming to hate that form of travel. Driving his Camaro gave him time to think about whatever was coming, and he would usually have a solid plan of action by the time he arrived. Last night's jaunt to the chemistry lab proved to him that he was no good off the cuff. His overreaction had nearly led to Stiles dying, and if it weren't for that freak gust of wind, that would have happened. He couldn't imagine what he would have done if Harris had carried out his threat. Lying there dazed and helpless, the pain causing him to lose the Alpha shift…absolutely useless to Stiles and everyone else…and that was why Derek made sure Harris' death was the most agonizing thing possible. Derek started to devour him while he was still alive, and in such a way as to keep him alive as long as he could. That was the price you paid for threatening the mate of Derek Hale.

In the end, he let Lydia convince him only because time was of the essence. With less than 24 hours to go, every minute counted. When they appeared at the vet's they quickly saw that Deaton was unconscious from a serious head wound, and also bound by the glowing purple force bands that Harris seemed to be so fond of. Lydia cancelled the spell, and did what she could to reverse the man's injury. When he came awake, he backed quickly against the wall, clearly terrified.

"Listen, I tried to stop him going after you! I have no argument with any of you! I helped Harris because he was a friend and colleague, but I warned him not to get involved with black magic! He never listened! When he said he was going to try to take a hostage to get his book, we fought…and he won. He was more powerful than I realized. Oh God, if you're all here…is he dead? Are you going to kill me? Please, I beg you…"

"ENOUGH!" said Derek. Deaton flinched and smacked his head against the wall, nearly knocking himself out again.

Scott glared at Derek before turning to his boss. "Sir, we aren't here to hurt you. We need your help. Harris is dead, and he totally had it coming; not just for last night either. The Succubus is coming to claim her kid, and that's either Jackson or Lydia. How do we stop her? Think before you answer; the words 'you can't' will likely send our Alpha into a feeding frenzy. We don't care how risky it is."

Deaton began shaking his head no, but then caught the baleful crimson gaze of Derek Hale.

"Look, if we had the name of the Succubus in question, we might be able to do something, but Harris never told me and now he's dead. There are literally thousands of possibilities-"

"Her name is Lilith. He mentioned it in passing last night." said Lydia.

The others started, then realized she was right. Lydia's 'Total Recall' was a force to be reckoned with. They all turned to Deaton expectantly, but instead of looking relieved he was even more terrified than before.

"Dear God, it _would_ suit his ego to choose the Queen of them all." He put his hands over his face and moaned.

"Sir, you're going to need to enlighten us." Scott said patiently. Derek's hands were clenching, and he seemed an ace away from twisting Deaton's head off like a bottlecap.

"Lilith was the first of them all. Only Lucifer himself is older, and only a handful of demons are as powerful. All succubi owe their allegiance to her. She was Adam's first wife, sent away from Eden because she wanted equality, and she found it among demon-kind. Most demons cannot reproduce, but when she was made, it was given to her to quicken with child no matter who the father might be. All of her children share this power, and the legions of incubi and succubi have grown exponentially through her efforts and those of her spawn. It is a wonder Hell can house them all."

"Wow, Jackson, our Mom is not only a celebrity but she's apparently been around. All this is great, Doc but back to the original question…_how do we stop her?_ What would have been your plan if it were a lesser succubus?" Lydia glared at the frightened man with her dead black eyes.

"To conjure up another of greater rank and power to challenge her. One whose price would be easier to pay…Harris' soul would have been perfect but I'm guessing he's already arrived down there. Lucifer is her only superior, and I won't call Him up. Glare at me all you want, Alpha of the Hale Pack. You could devour me in minutes, but Lucifer could devour me for eternity, and He would have us _all_ in the Pit within an hour of appearing before us. We would be better off with Lilith."

"Who are her equals then?" asked Derek flatly, annoyed that threats wouldn't work in this case.

Deaton thought for a minute, then his eyes widened. "Lycanus is one."

Derek looked shocked at this. Lydia was puzzled. The Compendium had not mentioned that particular demon's name.

"You know about him Derek?" she asked.

"It's…an old legend passed down among my people. How the first werewolves came about. He has many names, including 'Dark Man of the Forest' or the "Great Unknown'. He's haled as the Demon Prince of Werewolves. He's the one that created the first werewolf…supposedly he shows up in a forest on nights when the moon is full, and offers the power of transformation to people he thinks will do evil with it. My ancestor, Heinrich Heller saw him in the Black Forest of Germany, where the Little Red Riding Hood story originated I might add. Heinrich was what the rest of us called 'a bad apple'. His own son killed him for the brutal torture and murder of a little girl…and whatever you're thinking that he did to her, trust me it was worse; the… symbolism… comes across in the fairy tale as it originally went. Franz Heller killed his own father and inherited the Alpha position, changed the family name to Hale, and we have sworn since then to never shed human blood unless absolutely necessary. Oh, and I'll give you three guesses whose family the girl came from."

Scott's eyes widened. "No way, the _Argents?_"

Derek nodded grimly. "Now you know why they hate us so much. This vendetta has gone on for hundreds of years, and my Uncle Peter, Kate, Laura, the rest of my family…they're only the latest victims of it. Because _one_ person became a werewolf who never should have."

Derek turned to Jackson. "That's why my Uncle even in his madness never considered turning you, Jackson…why I didn't want to. Nothing terrifies us more than the idea of someone who is so greedy for it actually getting it. There have been a few Heinrichs over the years…and they always get stopped…if not by the Argents, then by us. I'll be the first to say that I was wrong about you, though. You had justification for everything you did, but that's a slippery slope to becoming like my uncle."

Jackson looked down at the floor, considering how easily his petty cruelty to others throughout his life and bitterness at the world in general could have worked to turn him into a true monster.

"That's not going to happen, Derek. And not just because I know you'd all come after me. I'm a different person now. Seeing Harris and how little he thought of everyone around him…I had a piece of that in me, sure, but it's gone now. I never want to be anything like him!"

Derek didn't need to listen to Jackson's heart to be sure the words were true. "You won't be."

"So how could this guy help us against Lilith?" asked Lydia. Although she was fascinated by the history lesson, they definitely needed to start making plans in the little time they had left.

"Of all Lilith's equals, he alone may be sympathetic to your cause. Especially since you are now his kin _and_ hers, boy." This last Deaton directed to Jackson. "They despise each other…it was Lycanus who poisoned the werewolf bite against Cambions, although Lilith's own gifts allowed you to bypass that edict with a trade. Perhaps he can be convinced to fight her for you!"

"I don't like it, guys! Even this Lycanus will charge you for his help. Who's to say _he_ won't take someone to Hell?" babbled Stiles. For once, no one disagreed with him.

"I don't see that we have a choice, Stiles. How do we call him up, Deaton?" Lydia asked.

Deaton sighed.

"Come with me." He went to one of the cinderblock walls in the ER and pressed a loose brick. The wall swung inward, and he led them down a flight of concrete steps to some kind of ceremonial chamber. On an enormous pedestal sat a massive volume, far larger than the Compendium.

"The 'Dictionaire Infernal.' It lists all of the known high ranking demons and the means to summon them."

Deaton flipped to the page concerning Lilith first. Her symbol looked like a heart with horns growing out of the top. The illustration of her true form was not pretty.

"My God, Harris was…intimate…with _that_? Which of her mouths did he kiss, anyway?" asked Stiles.

"She was in a human body, Stiles, though from this description Harris is incredibly lucky to be alive. She tends to devour her mates…he must have been a really sick puppy to get on her good side."

Jackson looked nauseated. "If I had to choose between her and Scott…I'd pick Scott."

"In your dreams. If I was going 'mo, my best friend would get first dibs." Scott jokingly grabbed Stiles' shoulder. Glaring, Derek slapped Scott's hand away.

"Over my rotting corpse." spat Derek.

"Yeah, Scott, you're like my brother, it would be too weird. And I go near _nothing_ that's been near Allison Argent." Stiles said absently, flipping through the book. He found Lycanus, and they stared at his picture. He looked like the grandfather of all Alphas, a veritable Fenris. Another picture showed his humanoid form, which was kind of shadowy but with the same glowing red eyes. The picture creeped them all out. His symbol was…a triskelion, or triple spiral. The same symbol Derek had tattooed on his back.

"Der, why do you have _his_ tramp stamp?" asked Stiles. Derek's eyes were wide, and he looked horrified.

"I had no idea…I just kept seeing it in my dreams, and started drawing it. When I found out about Laura, something made me get it done."

Now Deaton looked nervous. "You _dreamt_ about his sigil, Hale? Oh, this can't be good." Deaton sat down and held his head as if it were aching.

"What does it mean, Deaton?" Derek asked.

"I…don't know. He has you marked as special in some way. But if he wants something from you, Hale, that can be the bargaining chip to use with him."

"Unless what he wants is something completely horrible and evil for the world! Guys, maybe we're going about this the wrong way. Let's go to a church or something and hide there until after tomorrow. Demons can't go in a church, can they?" Stiles was desperate not to mess with any more demons.

"A church is a building, Stiles, like any other. And I don't know if the prayers of werewolves, half demons and a retired sorcerer are going to be listened to." Deaton said gently. "Something else you all should understand…Cambions can only trade things they actually possess or own, whether it is an object or a quality or whatever. Lilith and Lycanus can offer things far beyond that. Their bargains are _very_ tempting, and far more binding. They are also very good at figuring out exactly what a person would sell their soul for. You cannot let yourselves be tempted…they will focus on the losses that hurt the most and offer to undo them. If you agree, you are lost. The demon owns you forever."

They took in this information silently.

"If you want me to call up Lycanus, you have to let me know now. It takes time and preparation. I'll have to begin now."

Derek nodded. "Do it. I'll handle the Dark Man."

"Derek…" began Stiles.

Derek came over to him, surprised to find Stiles face wet with tears. "Don't. I'll be fine. We all will. We're going to get through this."

"You're lying. I can hear it. You're planning to sacrifice yourself!" Stiles cried out.

"Not unless it's absolutely necessary. That's what it means to be Alpha, Stiles. To protect the Pack at all costs. And if anything _does_ happen to me…well, you're older than Scott, you were bitten first, and you're my mate…so I'd be very surprised if you didn't become Alpha yourself. You would have to pick up where I left off, protecting Jackson, Scott and Lydia and all your families."

Stiles shook his head rapidly, unable to speak. Derek just hugged him tight

Lydia handed over the Compendium of Alchemy to Deaton who regarded it with awe. "It may be of some use. Deaton, don't screw us over. I have that entire book in my head, and have even improved on some of the spells in there."

"No, no…of course not. Thank you. I'll keep it safe from people like Harris."

"We'll let you prepare then. Lilith should be arriving at around 3:00 pm which is when Jackson and I were born, so we will be back here tomorrow in time for her. We have a few plans to finalize ourselves. Shall we head back to the lair, boys?" Lydia pulled another vial from her purse, and a minute later they were back on the Hale property. Stiles turned and stalked off through the woods, and Derek stared after him, an alien expression of sorrow and hurt stamped into his face, before turning and trudging alone into the house.

Scott and Jackson looked at each other and shrugged.

"Love just made Derek her bitch. I'll try not to tease him too much about this." said Scott, chuckling.

"Scott, unless you'd like you're next words to be 'Take me, Jackson, right here and now, pound me like chop-meat', you'll keep quiet." Lydia hissed.

Scott laughed, then looked horrified at her expression. "You can't really do something like that, can you? You're just bluffing."

Lydia shook her head. "I warned you." She invoked 'Aphrodite's Revenge', and turned away just as the two boys ran towards each other. She was out of earshot inside the house before the moans and short painful gasps began. First a bath, and then some beauty rest, she thought to herself.

About an hour later, Derek looked up from the chair where he sat researching his family history as the door slammed. Scott and Jackson stood there, their clothing disheveled and covered in dirt and grass stains. Their arms were folded across their chests, and they had thunderous expressions on their faces.

"What the hell have you two been up to?" said Derek in a bored voice. Scott opened his mouth to speak…then closed it and stomped out of the room, blushing furiously. Derek might have imagined it, but Scott looked like he had a limp. Whatever, it would heal. "Well, Jackson?" Jackson also failed to speak and followed Scott's lead, stomping out.

"Nice talking with you boys." Derek went back to his reading.

"LYDIA!" They screamed together. Derek sighed and went on a brief jaunt and bought an enormous order of Chinese take-out. When he returned, he found Scott and Jackson outside rough-housing while Lydia sat on the porch swing consulting a layout of playing cards.

"What's up with those two? They've been acting weird lately." Derek asked.

"They spent a memorable hour under a love spell for being insensitive to matters of the heart. Scott was sore in more ways than one, while Jackson said it wasn't as bad as he thought it would be. I felt guilty, and wiped it from their memories though. All the wrestling seems to be a side effect."

Derek burst out laughing, and he looked at the ground pinching the bridge of his nose while he gasped for breath.

The boys came up to the porch.

"Is that food?" asked the ever hungry Scott.

"I know something you don't know." said Derek.

"I'll take that as a yes." Scott and Jackson grabbed the food and went to the dining room to chow down, followed by an amused Lydia and a still-chuckling Derek.

As full night came on, Stiles still had not appeared and Derek turned to Lydia with a questioning look in his eye.

"He's still on the property. He's not hurt or anything…just very emotional. It's confusing and hard to read. Give him some more time."

{}{}{}{}

Stiles looked around the dark forest, suddenly realizing how late it had gotten. He was surprised Derek hadn't tried to track him down. He got up and began the walk toward the house, his glowing amber eyes allowing him to see his way clearly. His greatest fear, ever present on his mind since he first declared his feelings for Derek and found them reciprocated, was that he would lose what he had so recently come to care about. Derek seemed not to understand how Stiles felt. Derek had lost his entire family, but had somehow been able to move on. Stiles had barely survived the loss of his mother. Unbeknownst to even Scott, Stiles had contemplated simply ending it all, so that at least he would get to be with her again. The thought of his father and Scott were literally the only reasons he could find not to do it. One more death would do him in. He would just simply break. His father, his friends…his mate. He could not afford to let anything happen to them. Like Derek, he would protect them with his life, because if he lost them…he would have nothing.

A sudden movement in the woods caught his attention. Peering through the trees, he caught sight of a man shaped figure, shrouded in a darkness that even his wolf eyes could not penetrate. The figure was standing impossibly still and facing away. Somehow, Stiles knew that it was aware of his presence. The hair on the back of his neck prickled, and he felt every wolfish instinct within him scream in alarm.

But hey, he was Stiles Stilinski, the badass werewolf.

"Yo, buddy. Who are you?" he asked boldly.

The figure chuckled, and it was the laughter of the boogeyman himself. Stiles came within an ace of voiding his bladder right there.

"I'm no one. Who are you?" the figure asked in that same black voice. When it turned around, Stiles got one look at its face and began to scream.


	10. Chapter 10

A howl tore through the forest like none the gang had ever heard before. Even Derek felt a tremor run through him, the Alpha wolf within him (though not exactly afraid) sensed that to fight this enemy was to die. Nonetheless Scott, Jackson and Derek raced out the front door, the wolves emerging from within them to track the scent of their Packmate. Lydia grabbed her purse which clinked with stoppered vials, but by the time she reached the front yard, the others were gone.

"Men. And what exactly do they think they're going to do against a demon? Bite it?" she snarled aloud to no one. She immediately thought of a spell that she had been too afraid to try before. As soon as she began the chant, the trees started to whip their leaves, some even bending under the tornado strength micro-winds that buffeted against them.

Lydia called out a supplication to Aeolus, Lord of the Winds and lifted her arms while beginning to slowly spin around. By the third turn, she disappeared into something resembling a larger than normal dust devil. With a loud whooshing sound, it took off into the forest easily overtaking and surpassing the racing wolves. When she arrived, she found Stiles lying unconscious on the ground. He bled from a double dozen wounds, nearly every inch of skin covered with bite and scratch marks, many of them serious, but a quick check showed that he clung to life. Four deep scratches scored a path diagonally across his face. Lydia whistled and worked her time reversal magic, thankfully finishing up just as the Pack burst into the clearing.

Stiles did not wake, and Lydia continued to examine him while the werewolves took on their human aspects. Lydia placed her hand on Stiles chest and closed her eyes. A moment later, she gasped.

"What is it? Lydia, what happened?" demanded Derek, his eyes glowing red.

"He was attacked, three guesses by who. Lycanus must be possessing a human body. Derek, he…took Stiles' soul."

"Stiles lost his soul?" said Derek incredulously. They looked down at him, and the wolves indeed smelled that something was not right. The vital essence of his scent, the olfactory 'flavor' that identified him to the rest of the pack was missing. A werewolf smelling him could tell only that he was another werewolf, nothing more.

"Lycanus plans to have you over a barrel about something, Derek. This was his way of insuring that he had your cooperation, by taking that which you value more than your own life. He's going to offer it back to you in exchange for something. He must really want it to happen."

Derek was speechless. He knew that whatever the demon wanted, Derek would agree to it if only it could save his mate.

Lydia looked at him knowingly. "Derek, I know how you feel about Stiles, but you have to think very carefully before making a deal with this creature. It could only want evil for the world. Are you ready to pay that price?"

"I don't care. The whole world can go to hell. I'm getting him back." Derek's look defied any of the others to challenge him.

"Derek, I don't know about the boys, but I will be obligated to stop you." Lydia said evenly.

"I'd like to see you try, _witch._ Tomorrow at 3:00, you're going to be out of my hair for good. Then I'll have Stiles back." Derek faced off against her, his crimson eyes staring deep into her dead black orbs.

Jackson shook his head. "Guys, stop it. I'm ashamed of both of you right now. We are going to get Stiles back, and nothing is going to happen to Lydia or the world or anything. We cannot fight with each other or the demons have already won. Now stop this bullshit or I'm out of here."

"Jackson's right. You two can play Alpha vs. Wiccan some other time. We know you are the Badasses of the group, while Jackson and me get to be the pawns, but this time we're pulling rank. You two need to get over yourselves, now." Scott snarled this last. Derek glared at him, fully expecting Scott to drop his gaze. For a surprise, he didn't. Jackson and Lydia were staring at each other as if trying to burn holes with their eyes. Finally, Lydia dropped her gaze and admitted "You're right. I'm sorry I seemed insensitive about Stiles, I'll do everything I can to get him back of course. It's just that these guys screw you over even if you _do _give them what they want. Would you really send the world to hell knowing that there was a pretty good chance you'd lose Stiles anyway?"

Derek's glare lost its force and he turned away. "You have a point, Lydia. You just don't know what it's like for a werewolf when he decides on his mate. There is nothing we would not do to protect them…and we die without them. I want to see what happened to Stiles, Lydia. I want to see…what he suffered."

Lydia nodded, and conjured them back to the house. Stiles was put to rest on a couch in the living room, still unmoving. Lydia pulled down the built in projection screen in the ceiling and repeated the clairvoyance spell she used in the school laboratory.

An image of Stiles standing in the woods took shape on the screen. They saw him look towards the hooded figure and start in surprise.

"Yo, buddy. Who are you?"

The gang heard the figure chuckle, and of all of them, only Derek failed to shudder at the sound.

"I'm no one. Who are you?" the figure responded. When it turned around, they saw that it was Deaton. His face was in the midst of a transformation between human and monster wolf. This was no smooth transition that Derek or his Packmates were capable of, this was a torturous and agonizing looking shift made without regard to the werewolf's well-being. Blood poured from numerous wounds as the skin was stretched to the tearing point and bones were wrenched into new configurations, sometimes jutting from the skin. The enormous teeth sprayed a shower of red as they sprang forth, deforming the jaw they were mounted in. Finally the skin did rip wide open as the wolf seemed to emerge from _within_ the possessed vet. The demon wolf pulled the long strips of Deaton's epidermis from his blood soaked fur and dropped them to the ground with wet splatting sounds. When the uber-werewolf (far larger in stature than Deaton had been) was finished with the grisly show, it lunged for Stiles holding the screaming boy aloft by the neck. The clawed paw drew back and almost playfully swiped the claws across the boys face. Stiles continued to scream as more blood sprayed to mix with that on the already soaked ground. Another rake of the claws opened fresh wounds on his chest, then arms and legs. One claw began poking Stiles' stomach, searching for the softest spot.

"No…please stop…don't kill me…" whimpered Stiles as his struggles slowed.

"And what prize, what morsel will you deliver me, boycub, in return for this great boon you ask of me? A birds nest? A trip to Pharoah's Egypt? What, as they say, is in it for _me_?"

"Anything…please…" Stiles moaned. His face was now entirely awash in blood, his features impossible to make out.

"Very well! I accept your bargain!" And Lycanus bared his enormous teeth and shoved his hoary snout into Stiles' chest cavity…but rather than tearing through flesh and ribcage, the muzzle entered as if the boy's body were a still pool of water. When it emerged from the undamaged flesh, it held a glittering light filled orb. It dropped Stiles to the floor and spat the orb into its monstrous hands. Shadow seemed to swarm over the figure, and in an instant it disappeared. The screen went blank.

Derek had an expression of such broken loss on his face that if the others did not already have tears flowing down their cheeks they would have given in to grief at the sheer soul-destroying agony they knew he must be feeling.

"Derek…" began Lydia, her make-up running.

Derek's eyes rolled up into his head and he fell to the floor. The stricken teens just looked at each other. They were some of the most powerful beings the world had ever known, and yet they had never felt so helpless in all of their young lives.

{}{}{}{}

Scott, Jackson and Lydia sat at the dining room table in silence. All this time as they approached the date when they must confront Lilith, they had guarded against panic by assuring themselves over and over again that demons, while no doubt formidable, could be defeated if they could just be clever or strong enough. All of this confidence had just been destroyed in an instant. Jackson and Lydia especially felt no doubt that tomorrow at this time would see one of them beginning their eternal tenure in Hell.

"I stick by what I said, Lydia. If it comes down to it, I'll go." Jackson muttered.

"I was always the one meant to go, Jackson. Who knows? Might be the start of an interesting career. Maybe Mom will let me visit at Christmas."

Scott lurched to his feet.

"Where are you going?" Jackson asked.

"To bed." Scott said resolutely, as if this were the next step in his master plan to bring down the foundations of Hell itself.

The two Cambions looked at him as if he had quietly gone insane, and then nodded absently.

"That's good, Scott. If you're well-rested, we stand a fighting chance." Lydia murmured.

"My Mom taught me a trick years ago. I've never been good at schoolwork, and some subjects were worse than others. She told me that if I ever had an enormous problem, I should sleep on it. I know how this sounds, but it really worked most times. I would wake up with the answer in my head. Only thing is…I might be too keyed up to get to sleep. Lydia, do you think you could…?"

"_Dormin._" Lydia intoned, pointing her index and pinky fingers at Scott. He dropped bonelessly to the floor, and Lydia sent his body into the living room to lie next to Derek who still had not awakened.

"That's three down…" A sudden snore from Jackson interrupted her thought.

"Four. Now it's just me." She said aloud to no one. And in that privacy, she broke down fully, giving in to an emotional release she had not allowed herself since she was a toddler. When she was done, she cast a refreshing spell on herself to make it appear as if she had spent her usual two hours making herself up after a hot shower. She desperately wanted the release of sleep, but knowing how little time on earth she might actually have left, she could not bear to waste even a single second of it. She fetched her copy of the 'Notebook' and read it cover to cover, for perhaps the last time.

Scott dreamed. Although he had done as his mother advised long ago and concentrated fiercely on their dilemma, he found himself dreaming of a time when the history teacher gave them a single class lecture on the founding principles of philosophy. Scott's literal and reality based way of thinking was instantly at odds with the abstract mental exercises used in the lecture to open oneself up to more logical approaches to problems. He remembered being more frustrated that day than in any other class he'd ever taken. The more the teacher tried to illustrate the concepts, the angrier Scott seemed to get as the meaning slipped further and further away from him. Finally he had stormed out of the classroom. Stiles had gotten the only "A" ever in his high school career on the essay for that class, which was such a far-rambling exercise in ADHD fueled abstract lunacy, that the teacher actually felt out-classed in trying to interpret it. He simply assumed Stiles was a philosophical genius. Scott wanted to be furious with him, but failed when he asked Stiles what on earth the paper had been about. Stiles responded with "No idea whatsoever. I recycled it from that time we had that intro psych course. I figured if it earned an "F" in psych, it should get an "A" in philosophy, and I was right." Scott laughed his head off and they vowed never to take those subjects in college.

The lesson Scott had such a difficult time with involved the abstract question: Can God create a boulder he cannot lift? If God IS all-powerful, then he should be able to do it. But if he cannot lift the boulder, then he isn't all-powerful. It was what the teacher called a paradox, something that in a sense was possible and impossible at the same time. Scott simply could not make sense of the argument (which he felt was stupid, why would God go around creating boulders anyway). He lost his temper when, after trying with the other students for over an hour to puzzle out a solution to the paradox, the teacher finally told him that there _was_ no answer.

"THEN WHAT THE HELL WERE WE WASTING OUR TIME FOR?" he shouted. He had a headache, and needed to get outside so he could take a long honk on his inhaler away from the eyes of the other kids, so he left the class and spent the remainder of the day in the nurse's office faking sickness.

The dream was a repeat of the class, but Mr. Moore had been replaced with the demon-wolf Lycanus, who was devouring students in between asking the same ridiculous question over and over.

"Can I create a boulder I cannot lift?" he asked Jackson.

"Yes!" shouted Jackson.

"Wrong!" shouted the monster. Soon he was crunching on Jackson's head.

"Can I create a boulder I cannot lift?" he asked Lydia.

"No, never!" said Lydia.

"Incorrect!" said the monstrous instructor crunching down on her skull a moment later.

Stiles answered next with a "Maybe!" but was also devoured, and Derek got the same treatment after he gave the demon an irritated "Fuck off."

Now the thing stood before Scott, who was asked the fateful question. Scott tried not to be distracted by the thing licking its chops in greedy anticipation of a wrong answer.

"Well?" the teacher prodded. "Silence is also considered failure."

"The answer is…the answer is…" stalled Scott.

Lycanus' mouth opened wide, and the yawning jaws clamped on either side of Scott's head.

"There is no answer!" he shouted at the last second. Scott woke from his dream, realizing he had shouted aloud.

The others were all awake and staring at him. Lydia gave him a bored look. "So much for 'sleeping on it'. Here I was, placing all my hopes on your dumb dream…ahh, the bitter sting of disappointment."

"Can it, Lydia. I have the answer, I just have to figure it out." Scott muttered irritably.

"You have three hours. After that, if it comes to you, send it to me by Twitter. My handle will be SCOTTSUCKS."

Scott grumpily stood up and tried to go outside so he could think over his dream in peace. The front door wouldn't open. As he watched, the symbol of a heart with two horns sticking out of it burned itself into the wood. The sounds of windows and doors slamming all over the house caused him to run back to the living room and stand with the others as they looked around fearfully. Derek had a dead look on his face and seemed to be the only one not bothered by the spooky special effects. When the noises ceased, they checked and found (unsurprisingly) that each entrance and exit was sealed impenetrably, and could not be opened or destroyed in any way.

"I guess this is Mom's way of keeping us prisoner until she gets here." muttered Jackson.

Derek sat beside the catatonic Stiles on the couch. His face when he looked up at the gang was grim and frightening.

"We are going to handle this Lydia. First Lilith, then that bastard Lycanus. One way or the other."

There was nothing to do but wait and think as the minutes passed slowly. Eventually it was two hours, then one. At last, the appointed time had arrived. A wind blew through the house that alternated in scent between the fragrance of a young girl on the verge of womanhood and the sickening stench of a brothel for diseased prostitutes. Powerful nausea gripped the entire group, bringing them to their knees. Pink fire roared from the dormant fireplace, and a shape began to coalesce in the air. When it finally solidified, Scott stared open-mouthed at the human shape the demoness wore.

"Nurse Jennifer? You're dead!" he exclaimed.

"Fool. Jennifer summoned me months ago, in an attempt to win the heart of that ever-so interesting Alpha. Sadly, even the skills I imbued her with could not hold the interest of that cold and icy heart. My prize was the use of her body beyond her death, and so here I am."

She walked over to Lydia and Jackson, and placed her hands underneath their chins. She gently lifted their heads so she could study their faces, tsking to herself as if proud of a job well-done.

"My children…there are angels in Paradise with faces less exquisite than yours. You are two of my best creations yet…oh, so many will fall to me once I help you both find your place Below. Say goodbye to your friends…and don't keep Mother waiting. I can even take you to visit your father if you like." The pink flames roared again, then parted to reveal a long and fiery tunnel leading down to an inferno of a city. The buildings were of such an impossible non-Euclidean geometry that they hurt the eyes to look at them for long. Screams of tortured souls echoed outward, their torment all the greater from knowing it would never end. Derek even heard one that sounded like his Uncle, and another that could easily have been the unlamented Kate Argent.

Jackson and Lydia found themselves being drawn forward against their will, while the others stood frozen. They watched helplessly as the fiery tunnel drew ever nearer, and their hands found each other and clasped tight. In a few seconds, their long journey into night would begin.


	11. Chapter 11

A/N: Sorry guys for the long wait. Lately life has been treating me like I killed its mother, and I still have two more stories to finish. Thank you for your patience; here is the final chapter of "The Trading Game".

They were a few feet from the fiery entrance to Hell when Jackson called to the succubus queen.

"Why are you taking both of us? The deal said you only got one! Let Lydia go!"

The succubus in the nurse's outfit laughed. "Why, the deal was that I get one of you and your father gets the other…and he is down there waiting for you! Therefore both of you must go. Had you let him live, one of you _might_ have stayed. Now come along, children. Mustn't keep Mother waiting. Once We are safely Below, We can decide which of Us gets who. I'm thinking I'll let him have you, My son. I'm a little put out that the Prince of Puppies has soiled your essence."

Jackson and Lydia looked at each other with a lost expression. Derek snarled and rushed the succubus. She waved her hand negligently at the Alpha, and Derek was thrown across the room as in a hurricane wind.

"Do not presume to lay hands on Me, _mortal_! Unless, that is, you'd like to make a bargain? No? Then perhaps I'll destroy you here and now, and weaken that mongrel Lycanus even further!"

Derek was struggling to his feet when he suddenly fell back to the floor, screaming in pain. He clawed at his shirt like a man on fire, tearing it from until it fell in tatters to the floor. The tattoo on Derek's back glowed a fiery red, and the succubus drew in a sharp breath at the sight of it.

"Drat, that was unexpectedly clever." she muttered. Jackson and Lydia were on the point of entering the fireplace when they were suddenly tossed to either side. They slammed into opposite walls and were knocked out cold. The cloaked and hooded that was Deaton in the possession of Lycanus strode out of the fireplace and into the room. Scott ran over to Lydia and checked her vital signs. He knew Jackson would recover, but Lydia had no accelerated healing abilities. He glanced up at Lycanus as the demon spoke to the succubus queen.

"My thanks, Princess of Prostitutes. Saying My true Name in the presence of My Sigil? I couldn't hope that you would be that stupid, and once again you surpass all expectation! You will feel My teeth in that tender flesh of yours for daring to harm My chosen son!"

Lycanus made a slashing motion in the air with one of his mutated clawed hands, and Lilith screamed as five slashes raked themselves across her face. They did not bleed so much as drip reddish light. Lilith snarled and stamped one of her dainty feet. Lycanus howled as a huge crunching noise came from his torso, the bones that made up Deaton's body snapping under lethal force.

The howl became a growling laugh as Lycanus straightened up. "You dare? You forget that I wield more power than you, trollop! My children roam the world, while yours are gathered up by Hell! I am supreme!"

Lilith laughed. "Your children are almost extinct! This lot represents a third of all the werewolves left in the world! Cambion blood yet runs in the Argent bloodline, a variant specifically designed to enhance their strength and reflexes…along with a burning desire to destroy your pitiful mutt children wherever they be found! Their job is almost done! The last Alpha is here, and he will bear no children! When he dies, your earthly power will be finished!"

Lycanus snarled. "So it was you that that arranged for the Argents to battle My wolves! I should have known! You probably fed that human brat to Heinrich Heller yourself! But once again you have failed to thwart Me. Young Hale is indeed the last Alpha…but he will be an Alpha that the world has never seen before! In accordance with the bargain I made with Heinrich Heller, in the 13th generation of his descendants, an Alpha will be chosen…that's you, My boy. When you agree to receive My bite it will sharpen yours, and from that day forward, every human you turn will… become an Alpha. And you will turn them by the hundreds, and they will turn others by the thousands…and then we'll see who is more powerful!"

Derek finally regained his feet. The tattoo on his back was no longer glowing, but now seemed to be alive, the tendrils of the spirals uncurling and lengthening to entwine his arms and legs.

"No. I'll never do that! I'll kill myself first!" he said bluntly.

"But dear boy, you forget! I play to win! I hold the soul of that which you hold most dear…and I promise you that he will spend the next thousand years wishing bitterly that he had never been born!" The wolf's black lips peeled back from the enormous fangs. "There is no flesh so sweet as that of a young pup…"

"No! You can't! Don't hurt him!" Derek now realized the awful trap that had been set for him.

"Hurt him? My teeth will rend his soul until he is nothing but a cloud of mindless agony hanging in the black sky of Hell!

Jackson and Lydia came to their senses, and Scott pulled them off to the side.

"And as for you two pups…you will be the first to receive your Alpha's gift and continue My work! When the last human is extinct and this becomes a world of Werewolves, I will be free to roam the Earth forever…and the sooner that happens, the sooner I will return your young friend my boy…don't worry that he will be bored…I will devote all of my attention to him…"

Derek looked miserable. He knew he would do anything that Lycanus asked if it would keep Stiles safe.

Lilith was turning a bright scarlet as she listened to her fellow demon's plans. "You miserable excuse for a hellhound, you cursed cur! Jackson is _My_ son, and he will not run in your pack! I will purge your seed from him Below. And I will inform Our Lord about your plans…let's see you match power against the First of the Fallen!"

"Strumpet! The Morning Star knows and approves of My plan! Does not Revelation foretell the coming of a great Beast?"

Lilith's eyes widened.

"Then I am forced to destroy you and tell the Father of Lies that you planned to usurp his power. It is probably even true."

Lilith lifted one delicate hand and sent a beam of pink energy straight at Lycanus. It was pure destroying light, and had it reached the Dark Man, it may very well have vaporized him. Lycanus angrily sent his own crimson energy back at her, the two forces cancelling each other out while the demons grew even more furious. They stopped at the same time and glared at each other, panting.

"This is an even playing field. I'd wager that more here are allied with Me than with you. All I'd need is one to _willingly _pledge their soul to Me, and you would soon be little more than a legacy of body odor and venereal disease. Your children despise you, but do any here favor Me? Remember, Duchess of Debauchery, that you may not interfere with the negotiations under penalty of dissolution!"

To everyone's surprise, Scott spoke up. "I'll do it. For a price."

Lycanus chuckled in triumph.

"Scott, no! You're in over your head!" shouted Lydia.

"Stay out of it. Do we have a deal?" he asked.

"Certainly My boy. And what do you wish in return?"

"Three things." Said Scott smugly.

"Three? FOR ONE SOUL?" roared Lycanus.

"I think that so close to the endgame, you'd be willing to be a little generous. If not, then have at Lilith as you are…"

Lycanus growled. "Be careful boypup…My teeth are beginning to hunger for you. Very well, make your demands."

"I'm a little worried that my requests are out of your league. What happens if you can't fulfill your end of the bargain?"

"Short of waging war against Heaven or Hell or cracking the planet in two, there is little I would be incapable of performing. Under the rules of Pact-making, I can perform true miracles to seal a bargain. I can create or destroy matter and energy. I can unwind Time and reorder history, I can travel to every location in the universe at the same time…I can slaughter thousands or steal back lives from the clutches of Death itself!"

"Braggart!" shouted Lilith. Scott and Lycanus ignored her. She was powerless to act until the deal had been struck or turned down.

"Oh, nothing like that. From what you say, two of the requests you will find easy enough…it's the third I'm worried about. It may be beyond your skill. If you can't do it, then we keep what you have given us and I get ownership of my soul back and you go to Hell empty-handed and leave all of us alone, renouncing any previously made bargains affecting any of us or our families, forever, and that includes ties by marriage…and all of this with no hard feelings or thoughts of revenge."

"You pay attention to detail…I like that! But I will require more than just your soul as the stakes. If your Alpha fails to cooperate, I would like to count on you as a second…and much more willing…option. The pup Jackson will agree to transfer My Sigil from Derek to you should this be necessary."

Scott considered, then glanced at Jackson steadily.

"Yeah, I'll do it Scott. I hope you know what you're doing!" Jackson muttered nervously.

"Agreed. After the third request is fulfilled, I'll take the Sigil and you can bite me and I will take Derek's place as your uber-Alpha… if Derek turns the job down. I'll turn as many people as I can if I have to."

Lycanus' eyes narrowed. "You agree too quickly boy. You have a trick planned. I should warn you that this is a binding agreement. You will be compelled if you do not cooperate, and I may inflict any punishment I desire for refusal."

"Me? Refuse? Not at all. I agree to the demands and officially pledge my soul under the proffered terms."

Lycanus placed his hand on Scott's chest and seemed to glow with power. Lilith was gritting her teeth in fury. Lycanus turned and attacked her again, and she reciprocated…but this time the battle went in Lycanus' favor as his crimson energy reached the succubus queen and blasted her to smithereens of pink light. They whirled around before funneling down into the fireplace entrance to Hell. The flames whooshed back together, and the fireplace was run of the mill once more. Lycanus turned to Scott.

"Make your demands, pup. Try to worm your way out of this bargain by giving me a task I cannot complete!"

"First request; restore Stiles to how we was right before he met you in the forest…in perfect health and alive with his soul back in his possession.

"Done!" growled the Great Unknown. Lycanus tossed a blue orb into the air which dropped into Stiles' body, and Stiles immediately came to. He freaked when he saw the company, and tried to hide behind the couch. Derek ran to him and hugged him gratefully.

"Second, I want you to resurrect Derek's family and Stiles' mother… with their memories intact up to the day before the fire for the Hales and the day before her death for Mrs. Stilinski."

"Done!" shouted the Prince of Werewolves.

A family photo containing the entire Hale family save Derek (who took the picture) from the foyer floated into the room to hang in the air above them. Another small photo wrenched itself from Stiles' wallet to float next to the first. Lycanus directed a crimson beam of energy from his eyes at the photos, which began to vibrate in place. Red light shot out of them, and with an ear-shattering roar they exploded outward. When the light faded, the silent figures of the deceased Hale family stood there motionless…along with Stella Stilinski. Derek was staring in shock, and Stiles was openly crying.

"That recreates their pitiful fleshy sacks, now for the souls!" Lycanus looked upward and roared, the house itself shaking down to its foundations. A new figure appeared in the room, robed in white and carrying a flaming sword. His feet did not touch the ground; he hovered a few inches above.

"Lycanus. Why do you summon Me?"

"I'm calling in a favor, Azrael. I need the souls of these beings restored, under Regulation 3,604 section C paragraph 12 line 8."

"Demonic pact? Usually humans don't make such unselfish requests. Very well! I don't have _that_ one though, he likely resides down below with your lot." The angel pointed to Peter Hale. "And We misplaced _her_ years ago." He pointed at Mrs. Stilinski.

"You are the Angel of Death, Azrael. Your staff is hopeless, but _you_ should be able to find her."

"Hopeless! Do you have any idea how many people die every day! Plus, there's a hiring freeze that will last until Armageddon! Oh blast and botheration! Fine, but the damned soul is your responsibility!"

"Fair enough, I'll manage that one. Less forms to fill out when it's an Internal, anyway."

Azrael swung his sword through the air.

A cluster of clear crystalline orbs descended from the ceiling and whistled into the Hale family members, with the exception of one which emerged from Stiles' chest (he gave a short shriek) and into Mrs. Stilinski.

"Ah! There's the one that went missing!" murmured Azrael. "I'm off. I'll see you at the next staff meeting." A flash of light, and he was gone. Lycanus snapped his fingers at the fireplace and a jet of flame shot from the hearth releasing a crimson orb that found its way into Peter Hale. They started to wake up, but at a gesture from the Prince of Werewolves, they fell instantly asleep, falling bonelessly to the floor.

"Tricky, that was. I approve however, since most of this lot are werewolves! They will wake when Our business is concluded. Your third request?" growled Lycanus.

"Remember, if you can't do it, we keep what we've asked for and you get nothing!" Scott said simply.

"I should like to hear such a request. Go on then. Stump me!" Lycanus growled.

Jackson and Lydia looked at Scott with horrified expectation. Stiles stood with Derek, their arms around each other's shoulders as they moved among the bodies of their sleeping loved ones. They were both too overcome with emotion to do more than stare down at them.

"You can go anywhere? Anywhere at all?" Scott asked once more.

"Anywhere and back in a moment! The ends of the universe in an instant! I could be at the Throne of God in one second and ask Him about His golf game! The next could see me at Lucifer's worktable and comment on His latest origami! Nowhere is forbidden to me! If you wish is for me to travel somewhere, then give me the destination!"

"Okay. My third request is that you _get lost_." Scott said softly.

Lycanus goggled at him. Then he gave a great sigh, and began to shrink back into himself.

"It is well for you…that you specified…that there would be no revenge."

The black sticky fur seemed to pull inward as the body took on a more humanoid shape, the great jaws collapsing inward and the limbs realigning themselves while they watched in sick horror. When there was nothing but a muscled skeleton standing there in a cloak, a new epidermis began to knit itself from nowhere, and before long Dr. Deaton stood before them re-fleshed and blinking in confusion. The Sigil of Lycanus faded from Derek's back, and one after the other the sleeping people on the floor began to wake.

"_Mom?_" said Derek and Stiles at the same time, running to the people they had missed most in the world.

Stella Stilinski embraced her son. Her dark brown eyes looked deep into his, and she ran a hand through her own short dark hair in confusion…a mannerism that Stiles had long imitated while forgetting who he learned it from.

"Genim! How on earth did you get so big! Where's your father? Wait, why are you so upset? Has someone hurt you? I'll kick their ass!" Stiles was bawling too loud to speak.

"Derek? You're…grown! Gods! You're an Alpha! But your father!" The pale raven-tressed beauty (thinner and slightly taller than Stiles' mother, and with much longer hair) looked back and forth between her husband and child. Her blue-grey eyes were wide in shock. Laura Hale approached them, appearing to Derek six years younger since her body was re-created from an old photo. This Laura had never been an Alpha as her father had never died. Erick Hale looked his now adult son up and down in wonder.

"Derek, how did this happen?" he asked.

"Mom? Why is Derek suddenly my big brother?" asked the lovely 19 year old brunette, giving Derek one of her famous arm-punches.

Derek was too overwhelmed to speak, even after Grandma and Grandpa Hale, Henry and Michael and their twins, Aunt Alice, Roger and Janet (resurrected with her pregnancy intact) and even Uncle Peter (who in this life had never suffered through the fire that turned him evil) came over and exclaimed at how Derek had changed and to ask furtively who the hell the other people in the room were.

Jackson and Lydia took this as their cue to leave, and Jackson drove them home in his Porsche once they collected their things. They crammed Scott in the back seat, but only after the gang gave him a suffocating collective hug. Stiles introduced his mother to Derek, saying "Along with you and Dad, this is the most important person in my life, Mom." Once she had taken a few minutes to digest this, she awkwardly gave Derek a hug, and then followed Stiles out to his Jeep (along with a dazed Dr. Deaton) with a muttered comment that Stiles had excellent taste. Stiles yelled out to Derek that he would call tomorrow and drove home with the express purpose of blowing his Dad's mind.

Derek whistled and got his family's attention.

"Okay, you probably are all wondering what's happened, and it's a long story. It started like this…" Derek left out only Peter's involvement, implying he had died in the fire with the rest of them. As it was an omission rather than a direct lie, the room full of werewolves failed to detect it.

Three months later, Janet Hale gave birth to a baby boy whom they named Scott Hale in honor of the hero that they owed so much to. The Stilinski household, the Martins, the Whittemores and the McCalls were all invited to a magnificent (and meat-heavy) feast that featured an enormous fireworks (courtesy of some more Lydia-magic) display at the end. Jackson brought Danny as a guest (after finally sorting out the feelings he had about his lifelong friend), Allison came along with Scott and Derek also invited Dr. Deaton to join in as well. Before the party got in full swing, Scott, Stiles and Jackson were asked to partake in a small private ceremony that welcomed them into the Hale Pack.

"You're family now, boys." Said Erick Hale gravely.

Afterwards, Scott was startled to see that his mother had recognized Peter from their one date, and was chatting him up while he explained his recent loss of memory and expressed genuine interest in going out again. "Oh, good grief." muttered Scott. "That's the worst pairing ever!" he groaned and snuggled up to Allison who said only "I agree. They'd look nauseating together!" before lifting up his chin and smooching him sickeningly.

Steven and Stella Stilinski bonded unexpectedly with Alice Hale when they discovered a mutual love of vintage music, and they spent the evening dancing on the deck while one record after another played the hit songs of yesteryear.

Later that evening, after chatting with Henry and Michael about the ups and downs of a human/Lycan relationship, Jackson approached Derek and Stiles who were singing (badly) an endless karaoke of 70's platinum singles. Two sets of slightly drunk eyes rolled at Jackson's new t-shirt, which read: "Werewolves do it by Moonlight."

"So, Derek. I wanted to ask you a favor. Could you give Danny the bite? We talked a lot about it and re really wants to join the pack."

"Um, sure, I guess. Why does he want it? You guys having problems with…getting hurt?" asked Derek.

"No, nothing like that. It's just…I worry about him too much. Every time he gets injured on the Lacrosse field I get really jacked up about it. I always trade it away for him, but I'm always thinking about what would happen if I couldn't be there if he got seriously…I can't even say it out loud. It would really set my mind at rest, and he's okay with the idea. I've turned into such a worrywolf, I must be driving him nuts." Jackson glanced over at Danny who was now sitting next to Lydia while she read 'Brokeback Mountain' and he paged through 'The Notebook'. Both were sniffing and wiping their eyes.

"I know just how you feel, Jackson." said Stiles, hugging Derek from behind before jumping and forcing the older Lycan to carry him piggy-back. Derek's spine gave a painful crackle.

"Yeah, Stiles. Your concern for my health is overwhelming! Jackson, I owe you so much. Don't give it another thought. Send him over when he's ready."

"Thanks, Derek. You know, you were right all that time ago when I was feeling sorry for myself about being given up for adoption. I felt…so goddamned alone, and you told me that I had a real family that cared about me, and you would do anything to have it. I know what you mean now, and I am so grateful for my folks and so honored to be part of the Hales too. I have more family than ever, now."

"Was it worth everything you had to go through to get it?" asked the Alpha.

Jackson nodded, his handsome face lighting up with a huge smile. "Absolutely. I wouldn't trade it for anything."


End file.
